Upadesa Saram

October 21, 2022

Table of Contents

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40 - Verse 10

4 ways of spirituality: karma, bhakti, yoga, jnana. Temple provides facility for all of these. People do all four. Nothing happens, because the mind is compulsive - hyperactive. Karma becomes mechanical, jnana becomes ideation, bhakti becomes a show - you’ll need outer symbols of love. Yoga - should be conscious, lose the eyes, be aware of every single movement the body is doing.
How to feel brahman? You feel full and happy for no reason. There is no sense of dissatisfaction whatsoever.
Pleasurability is in the excited form of mind. Happiness is in the form of shanti, quietude. That is the brahman.
When you’re the brahman, why can’t you feel it? Because the mind is making too much noise. Like when there are too many clouds on a shiny day.
You’re unable to stop thinking. Thought has become compulsive. People suffer because of compulsive thinking.
Mind is a superb instrument if used rightly. Used wrongly it becomes very destructive.
This is not kali-yuga. This is pill-yuga. Because people are anxious and don’t have patience. Don’t start with pills. Start with jogging or a trainer.
Mind throws an opaque screen of labels and images on the vision, bhavana, love.
- Mind wants to bite into a problem. Like a dog needs a bone to bite into.
- Most of the problems are imagined only. They are very subjective.
Ego (me and mine) is located in the brain, not knee, belly etc. Feel it there. Therefore leave the head alone and begin with the heart. Abide there.
sa:stha -> en:stay
Mind should identify with its source “sva” - atma. Not with the outer. So it develop the quietude and merges in its source and abides in the heart.
In karmayoga the mind totally gets absorbed in the work you’re doing. It’s called karmasamadhi. That’s what you need, not karma per se.
In bhakti (sharanagati) the me, the mind, surrenders completely and there is communion with god in the heart. In bhakti you do not know why you love God.
- One becomes unconscious of things. No mind. No mine.
- No care even for one own’s body. No me. You become indifferent (not careless).
Love with understanding is bhakti. Understanding with love is jnanam.
Whatever you think with the mind is not Ishvara. Mind resolved in the heart, that is Ishvara.
Bhakta, karma, yoga, jnanam are not four things. But an unified vision.

41 - Verse 11

Once the mind becomes calm it resolves in the being.
You need a mechanism to calm down the mind. That mechanism is the prana. Because it’s between the matter (gross) and the mind (subtle), it’s an escape mechanism from the bondage.
- hold the breath for 30-35 secs
Parallel to buddhist vipassana.
Smile is the silent message of bhagavan Buddha. It is your birthright, it is love, it is freedom. Nobody can takeaway your smile.

42 - Verse 12

It’s not about God, it’s about you. You’ve got kriya shakti (the power of doing, vitalforce) and vijnanashakti (the power of knowing).
Power of doing is the prAnashakti. prAna has a synonym which is vAyu. Prana inside, vAyu outside.
Vijnanashakti, called also cit. Eyes seeing, ears hearing will not be enough… Mind must be there.
The two branches of shakti (kriya, vijnana) have the same basis - mUlam, which is the atma. Out of atma comes shakti. If atma is brahman, then the shakti is maya.
What is inside is outside and what is outside is inside.
In outside you have cosmic intelligence and the cosmic power. They have the same origin in brahman. The inside intelligence and power have the same origin in atma.
For seeing the separation, you don’t need shastra. If there is something common, then you need shastra. Shastra says the body mind is not important, the base is.
Citta is different from person to person, from human to animals etc.
When you see it is mostly vijnanashakti. When you speak it is the combination of kriya and vijnana.
Shiva weds Parvati. Shiva is the atma, parmati is the twofold shakti.
Vishnu weds Lakshmi and Bhudevi. Vishnu is the Atma, Lakshmi is the kriyashakti, Bhudevi is the jnanashakti.
Observe the breathing process. It will take you to the very awareness itself. It is obvious, because prana/vayu has originated in the atma.
Or be aware of the thinking process. Recognize it. Don’t contradict it. Don’t deny it. Don’t condemn it. Just be aware. The awareness of the chitta will take you to the source.
Awareness is watching, observation without condemnation. Then you come to understand.
Whatever you’re aware of without judging, you’ll come to understand.
There is identification (positive thing), not condemnation (negative thing). Both are bad. Go for silent observation.
You disturb you don’t watch. If you don’t watch you don’t understand.
The secrets of life one can understand by (silent) observation.
The personality is a myth. You’re not a person. It is the negation of the self so the egoistic self comes to an end. Breath will continue, thinking process will continue, person will be gone.
Very rarely you come across a person without demands.
Entire religion is demands and petition to god.
The ego-self is there only when you’re not alert, attentive, awarefull.
Watch natural phenomena, birds flight, clouds, rain. There is no possibility for condemnation nor identification, projection.
First vipassana teaching by bhagavan Buddha - have to enemies do for one month watch breath and they came back as friends.
You divide people because of identification.
Awareness is not a practice, not a habit, not a repetition. Awareness will always be fresh.
Meditation is not an act. It is being. It is atma. That’s why it does not help phalam.

43 - Verse 13

Manah is always the thought. The thought that binds.
Bad vasana is painful, sometimes even a good vasana becomes painful. E.g. obsessive vasana.
Mind is vasana. Mind is in the form a few vasanas. You get only a certain kind of thoughts based on your vasanas.
How to command the mind becomes the question of how to overcome vasanas.
Discipline means understanding. Control means struggling.
Not control (hathayoga), discipline - introduce some understanding into the mind.
Laya - vasana is resolved and it will come back. Vinasha - vasanas are vanished, destroyed.
Manolayah, manonashah is language unique to Ramana Maharshi, but the vision is there in Gita.
There is the potential always, whatever has resolved, it can come back.
1st way to command the mind: watch the mind (manovikshanam) - it becomes quiet. 2nd way is through prana you command the mind.
We should follow both. Watch the breath, watch the mind. Certainly watching the mind is superior.
Watching the mind doesn’t eliminate the mind, only the vasanas.
Breath meditation may lead to naya, but will not lead to nasha. Supplement it with watching the mind.
sa:chilA - is it not so.
You’re born from thought.
Manonashah - complete doing away with vasanas that bind us in this world. Fears and desires.
Sastra says the physical is less valuable than the subtle. Outside puja is less valuable than the inner. What you do with body (pujanam) is good, what you do with vac (japah) is better, what you do with mind (cintanam) is best.
Swami TV: one time I noticed I’m stingy. When I noticed it was gone.
Suppose you know that you’re in a certain condition, in a certain state. You know and acknowledge that (without condemnation), that is already a process of liberation. You become free tom that. That’s the power of knowing.
Confusion is the name for avidya.
Ramakrishna: a person knows god without knowing why he loves god. That is bhakti. That is liberation. But we practice religion as a means of security.
What is sanyasa? You might have a bank account, but you don’t need the security of bank account. Psychological dependence on the bank account is a vasana.
Question your motive. Ask yourself why do you … practice the religion you’re practicing? etc.
In Gita all motivated effort is not accepted. It is not against effort.
Ask yourself. Are my ways godly? My thoughts are they godly? My existence is it godly?
Once you connect god to the vasana, the vasana will not go. God is very powerful.
You must be simple inwardly only then you can be simple outwardly.

44 - Verse 14

What are you seeking, you’re that already.
Did you notice. There is not much talk of God, there is only talk of moksha - freedom from bondage.
Search for God started after 10th century. In Gita Arjuna asked so many question. Did he aver asked how God is? Your innermost self is the goal.
Even in Gita bhashya. Shankara might start with brahman, but he doesn’t take much time to switch over to atma. And later he says the two are the same.
If I’m that why I’m not feeling that I’m that? Mind is the culprit.
What you call body is an idea of the mind.
Do you have an body when you do not think of the body?
There is an illness only when you think of it. The illness is not there, if you do not think of it.
What is the world you’re talking about? Do you have a world without mind and sense organs? They work in tandem and only then you have a world.
And then you need a god. To create that world. You’re that God. Because you’re illuminating the mind.
Three kinds of screens for atma: thick (tamoguna), opaque (rajoguna), transparent (sattvaguna). How does the screen (mind) cover up - it produces a variety of thoughts, beliefs, emotions … non-stop.
What we’re looking for is vasanas becoming weak.
The idea is. You have to love the spouse. Not get attached. That’s poison while love is very full-filling.
Nowadays psychiatrist don’t counsel. Everybody wants fast results, so they prescribe pills. Is it treatment or is it suppression? Instead of suppression they call it management.
Suppression is called laya, vanishing is called nasha. We need laya. That is the first step. Then the treatment can begin. We need both.
Breathawareness helps exclusively to get rid of the nasanas, to get laya. Pranayama not only helps in getting rid of vasanas (laya) but also helps in physical heath.
For atma to shine in all its glory you have to get understanding (cintanam) eka (the one). It brings all vasanas to an end and mind becomes see-through.
Eti iti eka. That pervades the all. Because 1 you find in itself and in all the other numbers.
The goal is not to study vedanta and become a scholar. Do you want to get rid of diabetes or do you want to become an expert on diabetes having diabetes? Vedanta is not aimed at scholarship, it is ai/med at manonasha. Vanishing of the vasanas.
Realization and bliss: the actions, speech, thoughts are not tied to one body mind. They include all body minds. All life-forms. This way you self is not tied to one body-mind, but has become the universal self. It is not personal anymore. You have to feel this. That is the true religion.
Act of understanding is a religious act.
When mother prepares food and serves, in that karma (work hard), bhakti (preparation with love( and jnanam (knowledge how to cook) are the same.
Karma, bhakti, jnanam are all the same. If you try to separate them, it is the ignorance. That is the puja. There is no need for any puja.
Adhiatma, adhibhuta, adhidaiva is the same. What I’m, the universe, the god is is the same.
I’m you and you’re I. That’s the worship of a student of Vedanta.
Only adopt worships that inspire you, lead you to oneness. Or modify your existing worships.
There is no lifeless river, mountain etc. It is awareness as river, awareness as mountain…
Chaitanya definition: it is alive and it is aware. That’s how you have to see the world. Don’t set it down as inert.
All the divisions, everything is a play of chaitanyam.
Ekachintanam is a way how to do away with the egoism and merge in the universal.
Nobody likes persons who are always in their little-self.
Universality is achieved by negation, putting aside the small-self, not enumerating I’m Australian, I’m New-Zealander, … That way life becomes very smooth. You’ll not lose, you’ll gain.
Be selfish, but the right way. Selflessness is the best kind of selfishness.

45 - Verse 15

There must be conscious being to say mountain, only then there is a mountain.
Anything comes into existence only when a conscious being knows it. Therefore it is not just mere existence, it is always existence+knowledge. Example: you see a mountain in a dream. Is it a mountain? If it would, your bed where you sleep would collapse under its weight. Therefore mountain is the same as mountain-thought + consciousness, therefore consciousness only.
Original dhAtu: nash -> nasha = demolition. Disappearance is the better word, or vanishing.
Vasana is what converts the outer stimulus into huge suffering.
Jnani is not disturbed by wars, by what people says. He just remains very quiet. In Jnanis state of mind there are no vasanas. No thoughts generated by vasanas
The frequency of thoughts is very high in samsaris.
When the number of thoughts increases, the quality comes down.
Samsari is concerned about his life. So he believes he takes care of his life.
Uktrista yogi is not concerned about his life. Life takes are of life.
Person is created by the mind, by vasana. “I’m me”. And I’m taking care of the body/mind. Life is taking care of the body/mind or the person is taking care of the body/mind?
Whatever life is left to you that will be taken care by the life that pervades the body. Jnani knows it and therefore he doesn’t have any insecurities.
If the mind-created-person is put aside the body remains in good shape.
Teaching has become a magic wand for us. Can you see that the word “teaching” is teacher-centered. Learning is student-centric. Learning never ends.
Teaching means I know everything and you do not know anything.
Swami-TV: I’m not teaching. I’m learning, I’m inquiring with all of you.
There is a difference between sorrow and sadness. Sorrow is debilitating. Sadness is not. Sometimes you cannot help and people cannot be helped, e.g. are unsuited to help.
Sadness makes you poetic, philosophic and teaches you about life.
Natural state of the mind is thoughtlessness, silence. Like water is naturally placid.
When there are so many thoughts in the mind, you cannot understand, you cannot learn. When there is one thought, then you can learn a lot.
If you stop thinking (excessively) you will not become a zombie. It you do not you’ll suffer.
No particular thought is natural state of mind.
Silence of the mind is not mindlessness, is not dullness, is not inaction.
For him there are no duties, no goals to be accomplished, no world to be saved, no students to be thought, no samsaries to be uplifted. All are uplifted already, all are brahman.
When you’re ajnani, all others appear as ajnanis - double ajnana. First know yourself.
Mahatmas photograph has no value.
He (Maharshi) might do a few things, but he’s not duty bound. That’s why sometimes he answers and sometimes no.
People feel good when they have a lot of things. Jnani doesn’t need anything to be constantly happy.
Ashram food: breakfast: bread, peanut butter, milk, cereals, coffee, tea. Everything else is not necessary. Lunch: bread, brown rise, boil some vegetables. Dinner will be even simpler.
Chup meditation: There is nothing to be done, there is nothing to be avoided from doing. Because even “I should not do” becomes a vasana.
Belief is there because it gives us psychological security. You seek that security that’s why you believe.

46 - Verse 16

I’m that (intelligence pulsating through everything) by which I know I’m.
Sharanagatti - we allow the small self to surrender to the real, to brahman.
Samatvam - you see the reality in all in-spite of outward differences.
Live a life inspired by love and guided by knowledge. Understanding helps to move forward in the right direction, love to connect to others.
Small self is guiding you to perform something to get the reward, or to get psychological security. Because people are concerned about them selves. That is not karma yoga. Karma yoga is about the absence of self-interest. Desire is not involved with karmayoga.
Phalam is the self interest. Give that up and work. Don’t try to manipulate the phalam - I will cause that phala by this karma.
People thing going to the temple and worshiping the god there is karma yoga. That is not necessary. Going to the office can be karma yoga.
In India it was never about god. It was always about freedom. Arjuna is asking for freedom (from confusion), not about god.
First before answering the question “is there a god?” let us discuss what is god.
In life there are no yes/no answers.
If you’re not at all attached, maybe then we can say “you’re playing a role”.
You’re cit but you don’t know that. So you allow yourself to become citta (thought) then you see something nice and want to have it. That’s the downfall. From awareness absolute to the outward thing (drshya, the seen), the nama rupa. The real drashta is the caitanyam, everything else is the drsya.
Example for samsara, downfall of the cit: pure water coming from the mountain top becomes muddy.
Cellphone as become like an umbilical cord to the outward thing - drshya.
When there is internet, people cannot go inward.
We’ve become very bahirmukha - outwardgoing people. We’ve to reverse the direction. That’s Vedanta.
The sense of I’m - aham asmi - has no location. Initially we say it’s in the heart, because otherwise you’ll be in the head. “Me” as a location in the braincells.
Withdraw the outgoing mind and turn it inwards. It is possible.
An empty room is the most beautiful room. Because of space. Why do you go to beach? Because there is boundless space.
Inner silence is same as the spaciousness. If space is beautiful, all that beauty is in you. God is in you, Truth is in you, Love in you, Beauty is in you. You’re looking outwards for these things in vain.
Stop looking for something which is only within. When you go to the temple stand outside and say “aham vijnasu” then go inside, see all the idols and see “OM iti brahman”. Doesn’t matter what is before you, it is all nama rupa. All is OM. Third, all that is god is within myself as the inner most self. Close the eyes and see. If you follow these three the temple visit is integrated in Vedanta.
Set your vision right. Drsyavadittam cittamatmanah.
You have a resistance to go within. Examine that. There might be fear of losing things of the world. Of losing your status in the society.

47 - Verse 16

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Jnani is the non-doer. Brahman is the all-doer. And then brahman is also the non-doer.
Watching the mind is harder than watching the breath. For watching the mind you need preparation - watching the breath.
Nice Sanskrit word for daydreaming: manorajyam. It feels good, you’re the boss. In real-life you’re like a door mat. But it is worthless and wastes the energy of the mind.
How to put an end to manorajyam - chant OM.
Separating daily life and meditation is wrong.
Alertness is meditation.
Only those people need gym who’s lifestyle is sedentary. Meditation is like that. If you’re alert all day, you don’t need a separate meditation.
Watching is never doing. Watching - alert in reference to the mind.
All action originates in the mind.
Generally people are slaves to the mind and mind dictates their life. Dog should bend the tail and not vice-versa.
Physically you depend on the outer for everything and that is not a problem. Psychological dependence (bahirmukha) is a problem. Antarmukha is the negation.
Many of the youngsters are psychologically dependant on the light of the screen.
Unsmartphone. A person how’s using the cellphone a lot is not smart.
Activity you need not reduce. Reduce psychological dependence.
Comfort (animal) - psychological dependence.
What is the taste of your mouth? Something which is none of the six particular tastes.
All particulars begin with naming. What you call particular is not real, it just originates with naming. Example: You’re Pennsylvanian. Vacaramanam vikaro namadheyam.
Once you realize you’re not any particular, you’re universal. Who’re you? I’m a nobody.
Sakshi to the mind. Suppose mind is unhappy. Not you. What are you? Witness of the mind. By being a witness to the mind you’ve already overcome the limitations of the mind. Witnessing takes you there - sakshatkara.
Witnessing is the same as alertness, while witnessing is always with reference to something. Alertness is without a particular reference.
**Concentration is exclusive. That’s hathayoga method. Be aware. It is open, inclusive. You’re not pushing out anything. *** Don’t keep shabda, sparsha, rupa, rasa, gandha, sukha, dukha in your mind. It becomes a no mind. There is nothing except for silence.
That silence is not possessive. It possesses all. You’re not there (the person).
No mind is no thought.

48 - Verse 17

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Physiologist study dead bodies and don’t study their body. Therefore they remain ignorant of their body. Same for psychologist/psychiatrist and mind. That’s a way how to get a job, become a scholar. But it might not help the doctor to get control of You become a scholar.his own mind.
In understanding there is no accumulation.
Accumulation helps in outer life. Understanding in the inner journey.
It’s just the mind only, not mind or yours. Details from person to person vary, but the movement is the same. Just like each house has a different washing machine, doing the same job.
Many religious people make the mind into an enemy. We don’t do that. They want the mind to be attached to the conceptual god.
Religious mind struggles to control the mind and then gets into a conflict with it.
We’re not trying to control, but to understand what the mind is.
How to understand the mind? Read the books. Even better listen to shastra. Then do mananam. Then investigate/search.
First text that deals with marganam is Ramayanam. Sita is the mind. You have to find out what is the mind.
Mind is merely a machine, like software in the computer. It function like a physical thing, though it is very subtle. It turns around data and pulls what is required.
Every machine has a process so it produces something. For mind the process is thought process and produces thoughts.
The mind is also a recorder. Sense organs bring in the data. Whatever the mind feels is important is recorded. After some time it might be recorder.
Storage is called memory.
You can say mind is the result of the sense organs. Because mind (memory) is created by the experiences by the sense organs. Mainly nama/rupa. What you hear is nama what you see is rupa. That’s why you can say that the thought produced by mind is by its nature sensuous.
Thought that comes to the mind has its origin in the sense function. So you can say thought is sensory in nature. That’s why if God is an object God becomes an object of thought.
Therefore if God is not one more object, it cannot be an object of thought also.
Mind experiences through the sense organs, names the experience as pleasant or unpleasant. It gives a name to the experience and then records the experience which becomes memory.
Attachment and aversion are created by the mind by labeling the given experience.
Stop labeling. Become bland. When you see one person don’t see it’s a pleasant experience. When you see other person don’t say its unpleasant experience.
Language is very important. It determines the thought process.
Grumpy mother in law -> look at her, call her “mother”. You’ll tolerate it. And when she’s grumpy, just smile (don’t label as unpleasant).
Attachment and aversion are not created by god. You create them by labeling.
Whatever you understand, that will not limit you. Suppose you understand the mind will, it will not limit you. You become free from that.
When you wake up it is a new day. But you begin it as the old life. It is a new day. You’re meeting the new with the old. This is because of labeling.
Because of labeling you always respond in conditioned way. Your response is not fresh. Life is always new. It is never the old. In this creation nothing repeats. A cockoo says kuhu, that is fresh. Than it waits for a few seconds and again says kuhu. And it is fresh, but not for you.
Can you keep quiet for a while and meet the life without intervention of the mind? It is how we made life monotonous. And nothing can be more painful than monotonous life so you have to make a lot of struggle to get some freshness into the life.
Every single situation that life brings is new. And it will remain new only you should not label it - don’t call it pleasant, don’t call it unpleasant.
Put the prism of the life aside and meet life anew all the time. And you’ll recognise Brahman in all. This is you how arrive at sarvam kalvidam brahman.
The person is always fresh, never the same. In relationships also. A person is an adversary to you only when you meet the person through the prism of memory.
When Rama looked at Ravana he did not seen an enemy. He saw another human being. So he tells him, what happened happened, let Sita go, we need not continue this battle.
You create enemies by dividing the people.
Is it unpleasant? Should I feel unhappy. Should I do something about it? If I label it as unpleasant, then I feel unhappy and then I will do something about it. That is how samsara is created.
I smile, I bless and then I move on. That is the transformation.
Suppose you’re unhappy. Will a rose appear beautiful? Suppose it is sitting in your enemies house, will it appear beautiful? There is no beauty in the rose. If there is beauty in you, rose will appear beautiful.
Mahatmas do not make any appear to appear special, to impress. They just live very simple, moral life. Don’t hurt anything. They don’t go after anything (position, wealth, scholarship…). First you have to label it to go for it.
All complexity is product of ignorant thought.
All the circumstances are created by just only. You control the circumstances.
You can live always within the means.
Some of the difficulty in your relationship is your creation. From your side contribute and see that circumstances change.
When you watch the mind it becomes no-mind. No thoughts means no divisive thoughts.
Imagine you want to send an angry letter. Wait two days and you will not want to send it.
In a given day, how many times you check your email, tells you how what kind of unsteady person you are. I’m not talking about work, work is duty.
Whatever thoughts come, they depend on the vasana only.
The brain is the anatomical aspect of the mind. Mind is no different from AI. AI is mechanical, it is a process and it is accumulation.
Another name for AI is our mind only.
The difference comes only when you watch the mind. You’re not the mind, you’re the witness.
People are afraid of AI because they identify with their mind. It can be useful tool, if you don’t identify with it. With AI there is no witness, no atma.

49 - Verse 18

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An ill mind is very easily disturbed like water. Healthy mind is like honey. Once it is disturbed it comes to its natural state very quickly.
Once the mind is healed body will not cause any problems. It is the mind that makes the body sick.
Forget about cholesterol, pay attention to the mind.
Understanding the mind is the way to heal the mind. What people do is they readily identify with the mind. When you understand it, you’ve created a space between your mind and you. Otherwise mind is ill I’m ill. Mind is agitated I’m agitated.
Whatever you try to understand is necessarily the other.
Stop calling it “my mind”. My mind is pat of identification.
Believing there is atma doesn’t serve any purpose. Believing comes easy. People want to believe.
Another name for repeating is imitating. Word tradition provides security, a cushion to retain the ignorance.
When you live identified with the mind, any mention of atma can only be a doubtful proposition or you believe it. You do not feel it, you do now know it.
Mind is the thinking machine - it produces thoughts. Memory is the source of all thoughts. Thought has the name vrtti.
Mind is not a static thing, it is like fan, phenomenal in nature.
All the thoughts are centered around, belong to, a single thought. The me-thought, the ahamvrttim asrita. And “me” itself is a thought.
Anything can appear continuous because of the frequency. In waves there is no continuity. How many waves are produced is called frequency.
Me thought is appearing quite often to you, that’s why it’s appearing continuous. For some it occurs very rarely.
Everything is discontinuous in this creation. Mind is just a flow of thoughts.
The me-thought holds all the other thoughts together.
Ritual a flow of thoughts expressed as speech and action (algorithm).
When “me” gets attached to sacred things like tradition it prevents the realization of the true self. Because me has taken over the role of the self.
There is something in the background of the mind and the “me” says I’m it, I’m the atma.
Mind is birth of the me-thought.
I identified with the body becomes “me”. Now the “me-thought” is in place.
Once the me-thought is dismantled. Fear is gone, superstition is gone, doership is gone, anxiety is gone.
Mind is merely the me-thought.
We’re no better than inmates of a jail. We’re living in the space around “me”. This is the samsara.
You cannot have a center without the periphery.
Erase the person and you entire humanity will be your brothers and sisters. All religions take to the same truth and therefore I bless all religions because I do not belong to a particular one. There is no element that divides. Along with me the me is gone and such a person is called a realised soul a mahAtma. alpAtma is gone.

50 - Verse 19

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Content of the mind is divided into two parts. One is idam-part, this, and the other is aham part.
The mind is the subject as the “me” part and the object as the “this” part. The division subject/object is considered real because there is no proper understanding - ajnana. This appears separate from me, but it is the same mind.
Let the mind be calm and quiet. Don’t be angry, don’t be shouting at the people, don’t get frustrated, don’t complain, don’t try to grab, be gibing, be loving … and you need not bother about cholesterol anymore.
Healing the psyche is the priority, then the body. Be more balanced, don’t get anxious.
Learn to live with some discomfort for a while. Don’t rush to doctor.
The owner of the thought, ego/person, is but a thought.
People who put focus on the object are called samsaris. Vivekis focus on “me” and explore it.
David Godman: leave the mind with the subject-thought alone. Don’t allow any object-thought. The subject thought cannot stand alone, it’s need its opposite to survive. So it will find after a while and there will be no mind-hood, silence.
Moving mind will happily accept the job of finding the truth. It will come with its own version of truth. That’s why human mind creates religions.
When the mind becomes silence, it has the characteristic of spaciousness. Word for spaciousness in Sanskrit - brahman.
Direct path: neovedantis don’t have the entire baggage of tradition. Only deal with the question “who am I”?
Our weakness is trying to search for truth in the world of objects, “outside”.
There is awareness and there is the copyrighting, unhappy, complaining “me”. Ask the question, where from this “me” has come? Is it my true self? Am I this me? If not, who am I? This investigation you’d be able to conclude and when you do that the “me” falls.
Ramana Maharshi has made a sarcastic remark towards Vedantins: “this is atma vichara, not that”. Not reading big big texts all life. That is intellectual gymnastics. So you can use that intellectual acumen for self-aggrandization. Do you investigate atma in the silence of your heart or in the lengthy books?
The false self you can recognize, you can notice its movement. The real self, that you can recognize in silence alone, is invisible.
In explaining, I’ve made it what it is not. Rather try to feel it within you. All the experiencer are di-pole. Experiencer - experience.
The false self always seeks its own advantage. Always. In every relationship. The real self doesn’t seek, doesn’t need an advantage.
Don’t get too much hang on the health of the body. It is the health of the false self. Take care of it, but don’t get obsessed about it. There is nothing like health for the true self.
Whenever you give, express pure love, stop seeking advantage, in all that the true self, divinity, is epressed.

51 - Verse 20

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Unless you get rid of the ego, wisdom and high-thinking cannot originate from you, from heart.
Ego is that which stands between you and the moksha.
How to get rid of ego? Look within and see the elements of selfishness in you.
The moment you declare yourself as a guru in Vedanta, you’ve adorned your ego with sanctity, put it into the sacred attire of a guru.
Even when teaching Vedanta, see that the ego doesn’t come back in a different attire, e.g. as a guru. It comes in many forms.
Ego is the bhasmAsurah.
Ego is a self-destructive mechanism, don’t allow that to take root in your heart, in your consciousness.
In every single relationship, perseveringly dismantle the ego.
If you want to realize god, it is the ego that is the obstacle.
Spiritual ego is more dangerous than the worldly (ritual) ego. That ego might help you to get merit (punyam), but it won’t help you to get self-realization.
Aham brahman asmi is only valid when brahman is not separate from devotees, when it has no gunas. True god is not compassionate. Personal god is.
Grace means kindness shown, reward given where it doesn’t deserve. That is not brahman.
Vedanta is the wisdom that eradicates the sense of mine and thine.
Wherever you find a passion, that is ego. Vayragya is dispassion. The more vayragia you have, the more you’re able to dismantle the ego.
India: curry, cast and cow.
I like pizza - that’s the go. Swami TV: there is no particular curry that I like particularly. We need tasty and nutritious food, but don’t create and ego out of it.
When ego is not there straight away the mind because peaceful. It is the ego that creates restlessness, agitation.
The moment I compare my person, that’s ego.
Anybody who eats food in secret, there is something wrong with him.
Ego has its focus on (selfish) petty gains. Now you want to realize the timeless and space-less reality - brahman. You might success in getting petty gains, but you’ll miss the brahman. Person looking for mushrooms will trample over oak-trees.
Children are not born with an ego. They’re born gifted with divine innocence. As we grow up we become more and more intellectual and lose the innocence. Innocence is the godliness. Intellectual is the ego. We have to reverse the journey. From head to heart.
We lost inner silence and acquired thoughts, speech and action.
Keep the intellect but recover the innocence. Don’t become ignorant.
Biggest achievement in life, regaining innocence.
As you study more and more Vedanta, you’d be able to say “I do not know”.
Enlightenment is the state of maturity. No special event. In that state “come what may” you retain your smile on the face. It’s something to be lived, to be experienced here and now.
It is simple, don’t identify with limited (boundaries). That’s enlightenment.
When you identify, there is no love. When you love, there is no identification.
Ego is the most adapting, cunning thing. You have the idea of charity? Then ego enters it and adapts the charity so it becomes ego’s charity.
I was born in such and such place, I like such and such music. That’s not for a mahatma.
Jnana cannot be defined. Has no marks. Anjnana can be defined, it has plenty of marks.
Purnah is free from desires and fears. So whatever you think, say and do becomes spontaneous.
Don’t make studying Vedanta a head affair. You’ll feel superior to all around. You’ll not be able to give up the ego.
Misunderstanding that is also in Vedantic circles: enlightenment is an achievement in future. So you have to give up every-day living and look for the enlightenment in future and in some other place.
There are two mayas: digital maya is for the samsaris. Syllabus maya is for the gang of vedantins.
Enlightenment is not running away from every-day living. You have to examine everyday living. There is a thing called relationship. 2 kinds: with physical things and people.
In relationships with the physical things you have to discover enlightenment. You need an ego to establish one.
Anything that denies love and anything that denies the understanding of life is not enlightenment, merely a mischief.
You do not reach space by travelling. Where you’re standing now it is space.
To live in this world happily you need to use your mind and senses with restrain. Indriyas are fire. Be cautious what you put into fire.
You don’t depend on others for upliftment. Gurus are unhappy if the sisya is psychologically independent.
Health is the starting point for spiritual life.
Never do anything that will destroy your life in the long run for the sake of temporary enjoyment or short-term gain.
Body mind should be your best friend, not your enemy.

52 - Verse 20-21

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brahman is siddha (always accomplished), does not required a saddhana.
Heads of mathas never recognized Ramana Maharshi, because he did not take sanyasa in the proper way.
Brahman pulsates in the heart as aham, aham. Similar to electricity. It is throbbing, it is not continuous. 2x aham means it is many.
Pulsation of brahman in the heart is different from ahamkara in the head.
Dismantle ahamkara and hold on to aham.
Instinctivly disown body mind and that’s how a transformation happens in your consciousness.
My wife is a very dangerous thing. It is the unripe ego that makes the man feel “my wife”. She’s an independent human being with her own ambition and sense of life.
“My” means I can dominate, persecute, posses, dictate.
For some of the religious groups have such a huge ahamkara. No see other than themselves in the kingdom of god.
Unripe ego creates an artirical separation between the individual and universal (God). Like a river that is “separated” by a small stick into two parts.
Sri Ramakrishna’s way is bhakti. Instead of “me”, “mine” say God’s. I’m not protecting the family, it is God. And it is not mine, it is your family.
Liberation - vanishing of ahamkara. How does it vanish? When you see that “me” and “mine” is ignorance.
God is the karta, that is bhakta. I’m not the karta, that is jnanam.
Paramapurnasat has now acquired a new new name - aham.
When you put out of deep sleep you appear yourself as aham in the body mind. Whe you identify you appear as ahamkara.
When you try to hold on to aham it slips away. You might get a feeling that you’re unable to hold on to it. What you have to do is to try and try again. It is not even difficult because the sense of aham is always with you. You only have to remove all things (emotions, posessions, body, thoughts…) that you identified with aham. The sense of aham will remain.
“I’m” is the seed and god is the tree. Because if you not identify you’ll merge into brahman.

53 - Verse 21-22

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shesha - residuum. What remains after the ego vanishes. Why designate it as aham? Because it doesn’t vanish.
What am I? Because the question “Who am I” implies a person!
Catch 22 here. If you answer “What am I” in a positive way, it becomes ego.
What is akasha? Abstence of obstacle implies akasha. Eyes do see only prakasha (light), not akasha. Akasha is the adhisthanam for the prakasha. Akasha is what gives you avakasha for putting objects.
You have to know “that what is mortal I’m not”.
There is (false) security in ignorance.
Suppose I was not born, I’m not going to die. I’m now in open space. What am I?
Long life is a curse. But we have rituals for long life.
Take stock of the ways how you think and feel about the body/mind. The way of thinking and feeling you have makes you bound.
Wake up early in the morning. Remind yourself to work hard and be compassionate to all the human beings. You’re life will be OK.
The most obvious things are the most doubtful things. You have to question them.
People have fallen into syllabus maya. Most of India has while Ramana Maharsi asks the right question.
You’re not a jnani, you do not know what is atma but you become a vedanta acharya and teach vedanta.
Mind takes care of the body, not you. Body becomes sick, mind provides medicine.
Shani is not a person, shani means that which means slowly.
Hunger is also an illness, you know how to treat it.
Swami who is blind. He is 100% OK with his blindness. How? I’m not the indrya!
What is life? Life is longevity. Don’t identify with life - prana. It doesn’t matter how long you live.
People identify with work. That’s another aspect of prana. Are you the one who works? Are you the karta? Are you the prana? You’re the one who knows. When you’re walking you’re not the one who walks. You’re the one who knows that the body is walking.
Do not seek anything.

54 - Verse 22

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Akasha is lokus for some-things. But it is not one of those things. It is the locus where all those things are residing. You’re like that.
Animal is something. But you’re not something. You’re the very light of consciousness in which the animal comes to light. There is no animal, human, god without you. You must be there for something to be an animal, something else an human and something else a god.
Jagat is what you observe, not what is. Like a movie, a movie is what you observe. What is is the screen and the light.
Eka-sat. What is it that exists? You. Nothing else exists.
Follow the cardinal principle - whatever you perceive, is not you! Perception is made possible only because it is the other.
Dhi - the mind, is always perceived by you. Mind is ever change-full. What is it that doesn’t change? Change requires a changeless background.
When you move in space fast, and you see nothing, you don’t feel the speed. When you are close to the clouds - reference points, you’ll notice how fast you move. You need a reference point to see and notice the change in the mind.
Anything that changes requires a changeless background. And that changeless background is you.
When you identify with something you become the servant and the something becomes the master.
In identification there is slavery at a very subtle level.
The mind is knowing the mind, doesn’t matter. As the mind knows the mind the knowing mind becomes the higher mind and the known mind becomes the other and evtl. the higher mind becomes the other which becomes one with the brahman.
Use your mind to know your mind is the best preparation for knowing the mind.
When you wake up, remind yourself two things 1) I will work hard 2) tell yourself I love all. I love the person who throws mud at me, who slaps me in the face, I love all.
Thinking is not your own. Being is your own. Thinking is the other. Knowing is your own. Being is knowing. Joy is your own. Pleasure and pain are not your own.
Intellect (also called dhi) has only one job - accumulation.
People have the habit of accumulation. Even in temple, they accumulate gods. And they bring this habit into vedanta and fall in “syllabus maya”.
Vedanta is different. Anything that applies in the worldly or religious life doesn’t apply to vedanta. There is syllabus maya for vedanta and digital maya for samsara.
Person has become digitalized, it is no more an individual. You’ve become a number in the digital maya, you’ve lost your astitvam (existence/identity).
People always look for entertainment, because they are bored with what they are. Identified with mind, constantly seek entertainment. They’re fed-up with themselves. And where will be entertainment - in the digital world.
Accumulation of knowledge outside of Vedanta is good, helps you have a good life. Vedanta is to be lived.
If you identify with the mind, you lose your existence. You’ll be as good as dead. Mind is not the being, it is the doing, the thinking.
Worldly people love to identify with ajnana. They are very cunning, esp. the family people.
You’re blind people. Be that. Don’t ask any more. I can’t educate ajnanis. You love to be ajnani? Be that.
Only the innocent people will come to know the truth. Being innocent, you’ll suffer now and then. But don’t lose your innocence, don’t become clever to declare “we’re ajnanis”.
Identifying with ajnana is not humility, it’s cleverness. If you sincerely believe you’re ajnani, then you’re ignorant. Either you’re ignorant or clever, but you’re not wise in declaring you’re ajnani.
“I’m not ajnani, I’m jnana svarupa. It is only incidental that I don’t know Russian.”
You know that you are? You’re a jnani. Because there is only one thing to know.
Worst possible ID is to identify with blindness and declare I’m blind.
All are ideas (money, wife, everything in this world) only I’m is real. There must be mind first to declare this is such and such. Only one thing is not an idea. Aham, the witness, I’m.
Did you ever hear of a god without a devotee? There must be a devotee first in order for a god to be.
Brahma is when he is. When there is no brahma, then he is not there. When he is not there, there is no brahma.
You wake up as I’m. You’re the first. I’m is not an idea, it’s brahman shinning in your heart.
Who am I? I’m a father of two children? Wrong. I’m a Vedanta acharya? Wrong. Don’t look for an answer to “Who am I?”.
When you ask the question “Who am I?” and understand that there is no answer that can come from dhi, you go beyond mind. Identification with the mind snaps.
When the mind becomes quiet, I’m shines. Even the I’m resolves and remains as the pure unselfconscious being. Ekasat. Therefore “I’m” is the gateway to brahman and if you add something it is the gateway to samsara.

55 - satsang

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Do you feel that caste-consciousness in you? I have to ask myself? Am I conscious of that? Rise above every single bodily identification.
Cheerfulness in the mind has to be replaced by sadness or sorrowful. This happens. Only you should not identify with that sorrow. Now the mind is sorrowful and you’re aware of that. Are you maintaining that inner space or not? You’ve to check.
People are constantly changing for entertainment because they are empty. Or outrightly unhappy and insecure.
If you’re honest to what you study. And if you do not admit the two pitfalls: ritualization and entertainment then there will be the inner space. There will be always space in reference to the mind. The mind can still bother you, but not that much.
Did the event from the last N years perturb me?
As the modernity increases and the lifestyle becomes more and more sense-oriented, obsession with the body becomes part of peoples’ lives and the samsara gets bigger.
Don’t depend on others for help. Never. Help yourself. Be a light on yourself. Tell yourself always in the morning: work hard and love all.
In India, we don’t live by law. We live by dharma. It’s a dharma civilization, not legal.
You’re 50 trillion cells. They’re all intelligent. And they’re all love. That’s why the red cell love every other cell and supply nutrients and oxygen. Same for brain cells supplying right kind of messages, stomach cells … Every cell loves the body to keep it alive. They don’t know what is hate.
When you hate somebody, your cells get confused. In their confusion, cells become cancerous - create autoimmune disease. As you start hating, your immunity will come down.
Do loving kindness meditation. It’s integral part of your existence. You love (all) is same as you exist.
There is nothing that doesn’t deserve your love. Close the door carefully, use the car properly, what to speak of living beings. Love all.
There are no binding desires, there are no simple desires. Don’t categorize them. There is only poison. Give up even desire for moksha - that’s called yoga! As long as you desire yoga, and therefore you want moksha, and do not want no moskha, you’re not equanimous. You’re inclined favourably to moskha and therefore you not sama.
You’ve to reach the point where you think I’m always liberated. Moksha is my svarupa. I’m equanimos to moksha or no moksha. Mumukshutvam is provisional.
The desires are not in you, they’re in the mind.
Desire makes you small. Desirelessness is godliness.
Seeing that the body and mind is not mine. The way how you think and feel about it defined whether you have raga, or its opposite - vayragya.
There is space in the pot? Incorrect. Space was always there. Then pot came. So pot is in the space.
Wave is in the water is the correct way to say. Not water is in the wave. Similarly atma is the adhisthanam for the mind.
Mind is in the body - wrong. Mind is not in the brain also. Mind is different, brain is different. Brain is the body, mind is not the body. Mind is the consciousness - knowing quality in you. Entire body is inside of the mind. Therefore the volume of the body is the volume of the mind. Another name for the mind is consciousness.
As long as you think that there is the body, inside the body is the mind and inside of it is the atma, vedanta is not for you. There is atma - spacelike awareness. There is movement, which is the mind. Body is merely an idea in the mind. If you understand that, you’re free already.
Examine your experience, that is the proof. You’ve the body only when you think of the body.
Science unites people while the religion divides. As long as there is no problem, people co-exist, they don’t love each other. Popular religion is connected with money, it is all commerce.
Religion is belief. Belief divides people. Science, or philosophy, don’t. Love for knowledge unites people.
Intense sugar we should not consume. A little bit of sugar is OK.
In Vedanta never ever offer god other than atma. By offering another god than atma you’re string at the fundamental oneness. Therefore please not, that the god you worship in temple, is never separate from your innermost self.
Belief goes with no thinking. Religion is a belief system.
(Material) science is the study of nama-rupa and that’s why you have to supplement it philosophy, the higher science. The science of atma. Vedanta is not religion of atma, it’s science of atma.
First have some idea of physics and then only you’ll understand vedanta.
Vedanta is science. Newton published his three laws of motion in the journal of philosophy.
Don’t get carried away by social movements. Ignore them. It’s all mithya. They’re none issues. Only one thing. Love all. Loving kindness. Love in all directions. We love all people, whatever name they give to themselves. He says what is atheist, he says he’s a great devotee? Neither know what is god, but you love them both. Just don’t love their ideas, you’ll be most confused person.

56 - Verse 22

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Eka - all-pervading atma. One is called eka because it is find in every natural number.
In the movie, the light is real and the heroine is not. But it is perceived the other way.
Based on your vasanas, you acquired the body. Ishvara doesn’t give the body. Ishavara provides the entire infrastructure of creation.
Hero, heoroine are not shining on the screen. They are opaque forms. Whereas light is luminous.
Biggest misrepresentation of Vedanta. You talk of jagat as mithya, but the body, mind are taken as real.
World appears real to you only because you believe (in) it. If you question the reality the world resolves like a dream.
Can you separate the dream for yourself? The dream (world) experience is not independent from you.
How silly is it to be afraid in dream?
Don’t give reality to the dream, it will resolve. Same way don’t try to derive happiness from the world. The happiness is in you, not in the world.
Whys and Hows of the world will never end. Therefore give up all desires. And let the mind become silent (it generally becomes silent when there is no desires). And you’ll discover that the world is unreal.
The world appears real because you think of it all the time.
Aham ekasat. Who can insult me. You stop thinking about it and the insult vanishes.
Forgetting is not in your hands. Forgiving yes.
If you become desireless everybody will be happy. Everybody is tired of your desires.
When you give up desires, fears will also go away.
Is there a world outside of my knowledge?
World is true in its essence, false in its appearance.

57 - Verse 23

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Generalization (expansiveness) vs. Particularization (making a groove). Vedanta is not getting stuck in a group. Vedanta is expansiveness in your consciousness.
One group of people in Samsara is addicted to work - kartas. The other is bhotkas - looking for more and more bhoga and become sick. They will have always fear of disease.
In generalization there are not many gods, there is only one atma.
You’ve to discover the general in all the particulars. Every single thing (particular) IS. Can you talk of a thing which is not associated with IS?
In the beginning was the ISness alone.
Don’t hold to that which vanishes - forms, hold on to what doesn’t vanish sat-chit-ananda.
From the standpoint of timeless it is sat, from the standpoint of spaceless it is called brahma. Sat happens to be also chit, from that standpoint it is called atma.
It is not sat as a particular piece of form, it is not chit as a particular piece of knowledge.
What you’re accustomed to are the pieces.
Once you come to the domain beyond space and time, there are no objects but only general ISness. But the objects are illumined by particular piece of knowledge.
In dvaitam sat and chit are different. Sat is here and chit is in Vaikunta. Sat is outside, chit is inside.
Sat and chit are not two. Shiva and parvati are not two. Lakshmi and Vishnu are not two.
You can say: being itself is divided as inner and outer. Body is the dividing line. But is existence really divided? Suppose it is between “I’m” and “there is”. Then “I’m shines” by itself. “There is” should also shine by itself. But “there is” doesn’t shine by itself. Chit that illuminates “I’m” has to illuminate “there is” also. Therefore you cannot have one without the other.
In fact the dividing line is the ajnana.
It is the mind that creates the aham and idam division. Allow the mind to become silent. Let awareness take over. Eyes are open, you still see with the yes only, but without the (prism of) mind. You’ll not experience the sense of other - I’m looking at the tree which is other. You do not feel it.. I’m the same as the sun is. I’m the tree, I’m the sound of the bird …

58 - Verse 23

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abhava is always relative to something.
Hero’s existence on the screen, is it his existence or the existence of the light?
You do not exist outside of Ishvara. Jagat is Ishvara’s dream, Ishvara’s consciousness. There is only jiva - ekajivavada.
Jagat appears so tangible, knowable, real only because of one reason and that is deha-abhimana. It makes you a separate entity in the jagat now you isolate yourself from the jagat and look at the jagat. And you, the me, is real. Therefore jagat is real. That is your problem.
Why do you say jagat is knowable? Because you’ve got a mind and you’re that mind and you’re looking with the mind. Therefore it appears real. Who told you your mind is real?
Anything you constantly think (of) appears real.
You think constantly of a person favourably now he’s a friend. He’s not friend. He was not born like that. You’re giving reality to the emotion because of constant thinking of it. Emotions appears real because of that.
The value given to something is entirely subjective.
Nothing is knowable, nothing is tangible. It appears knowable because you think of it, it is tangible because of your ajnana. There is only consciousness.
All are samsaris, there are no friends, there are no foes. But because you constantly think of world it appears real to you.
What they sell (parfume, antique pot) is no thing, they sell you an idea. What you call jagat, is entirely an idea.
You’ve Ishvara only because you take yourself to be a jiva. If your jiva status is unreal, then Ishvara is just as unreal.
Atma is word, a vision, in which jiva and Isvhara come together.
Everything is a superimposition, there is only one truth - the pulsation of aham.
When it comes to outer thing, it is there only because it shines. When it comes to atma, atma shines because it is. It is therefore it shines applies only to your innermost reality.
While thinking, feeling, do you’d have the quality of witnessing in your or else you’ll establish yourself as a samsari. To have that quality you have to be aware of your being.
Being, shining as knowing is freedom, because it is witnessing. When you think, feel and do there is no freedom. When you witness there is freedom and that’s why it is called ananda.
Ananda comes to the fore when you’re aware of your being.
People come to swami because of their love for learning. Suddenly they replace they love for learning with love for doing. And they enter into a complacency. Are you learner or a volunteer?
Love to do is ignorance! Replace love to do with love to be.
Without reflecting in the antahkarana, there is no world.
The being in its distorted state appears as the world. In its undisturbed state is experienced as blissed.

59 - Verse 23

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Isha is the one who commands and controls all. Controller and commander.
Aishvarya is overlordship.
In Roman empire, you could not violate law. Just like in the USA. In India, we violate law all the time, we care about dharma.
St. Paul: there is a Christ in every heart. Buddha: each one of you is Buddha.
Jesus Christ is not a proclaimed dvaiti. Vatican is. Vatican proclaims that you’re all sinners. Jesus Christ did not.
Whatever difference you see between Ishvara and Jiva is entirely due to wrong notion caused by ID with attire.
If you can rise above the upadhi, you experience oneness, otherwise division.
Why do you take yourself as jiva? Because you were born and you’ll die. Bulb might be small or big, but the size of the bulb doesn’t belong to electricity. If you do think like that, you’re deluded.
The ritualist has a solution for anything and everything.
It is the never the big one (god) who asserts “I’m the big one”. It is always the god (devotee) who asserts he’s small.
The person takes himself to be small and projects the big and calls it god. Now tell me if god came from man or man came from god? First man made god in his image and then that god makes man in his image.
Varta means moving.
Mind is vartamana (the present, moving in the present, projecting past and future), atma is vidyamana, sat.
The false self projects a big self other than itself. If the smallness of the small self is false, the bigness of the other is equally false.
Don’t ask me to prove that ishvara and jiva are the same. Dvaiti, prove that they are different. The burden of proving the criminality is with the prosecutor.
Intellect (like filament) has limited knowledge. Chaitanya (like light) has limitless potential.
20V is in terms of gadget only, does not apply to electricity. All measurement, descriptions belong to the gadgets (body/mind).
Ajnana (maya) it doesn’t obscure sat. Therefore you feel I’m. You never feel I’m not. There is never a doubt.
Sat is not obscured by maya. Chit is obscured that’s why you feel I know a little and god knows a lot. Same for ananda. Therefore chit creates particulars. Sat is the foundation and there are not particulars in sat.
Why there is ignorance? Because you do not investigate the true self.
Did you ever think of God other than you when you’re entirely desireless and fearless. That’s why sruti says tatvamasi. Not go and worship god - that’s karmakanda.

60 - Verses 24 - 25

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Vesha dhi bida - division because of wrong thinking.
TV: In India, we don’t ask with courtesy, we don’t believe in such things.
Ramana Maharshi nowhere talks of another god other than you. Modern gurus, advaita gurus, talk of god outside only.
Unlike for jiva, there is no attire for ishvara. No physical, no mental.
God is not a person, nor you’re a person. The personal attire (upadhi) creates a division.
In the upanishads, when the person is not ready for atmajnana, upadhi is allowed provisionally.
Everybody is experiencing the same self, I’m. That experienced by the self is sallied by a variety of imaginations.
Jnanas and vasanas cannot stand side by side. Therefore you have to put some effort to shake off the vasanas.
God you’re worshipping is all-knowing. Why your god is all-knowing? Because you know. A bit. Because you know god becomes all-knowing. He came from your natural quality of knowing. Same for power.
You project an ideal and that ideal has connection to you only. What you worship as God, It has originated from you. You imagine that is separate and project it outside, because of your vasanas.
To overcome the vasanas, it is good to do some upasanas for a time.
The provisional upadhi is not supposed to be permanent!
Why god is having human form? Because god is essentially human. God is in you. And you continue to put your vasana on god.
You project the god and you create an attire for the god. Remove the attire and examine what is it essentially. It is the awareful being. What is you essentially.
Take out the attire of god, take out the attire of jiva, it is only one.
Feel the pure I’m to reach the pure I’m.
When you stop thinking yourself in terms of a person than the pure love emerges.
Being is the same as knowing which is the same as loving. Sat-chit-ananda.
Ananda in its expression is love.
When you’re a person, you cannot love. Only when you’re not a person you can love.
Don’t praise world as glory of the Isvhara because you’ll have a problem to say the world is unreal with the same mouth.
Waking consciousness is entire movement of the mind in the waking state.
No two people live in the same world. Even wife and husband. Fortunately there is some overlap. Sometimes they overlap entirely.

61 - Verse 25

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Namarupa are the screen to cover up
Seer sees his essence - knows his true self. You’ll be liberated. From what? Bondage of samsara. You’ll not be afraid anymore. Dissatisfaction is over. You’ve to experience it, it cannot be described.
Goal: self knowledge.
Mind is the only source of unhappiness. It created a person, you identify with it.
Work is also a vesha. You do not work. Body/mind works.
All the veshas have one source. That you were born.
By going to sleep and falling dead, we lose everything.
People assume (wrongly) that atmajnanam consists of grasping something.
You have senses or can infer. That’s your toolbox. But atma is aprameya - it cannot be reached.
As long as you have this innate tendency, which is the same as seek using the toolbox you’re endowed with, so long you will not know atma.
Those who seek the knowledge of the self will not know the self, but only seekers will know the self.
Atma can be described only in negation.
The day you understand you’re not related anything you’ll understand the truth of yourself.
The other person say I’m a fool. He’s not a fool - I am.
In every situation avoid fragmentary thinking and you’re already in the embrace of the atma. Because ama is undivided. Atma is not a composite, there are no parts in atma.
Nothing ever happens to me. That’s the truth. But we take that something happened to me all the time.
Phobia - you think everything is happening to you.
As long as you put effort, you won’t reach atma. Effort is struggle.
How much effort do you need to transport into the head the vedanta syllabus? Effort can make you a scholar, but won’t liberate you. Effort can make you somebody, but can’t make you understand you yourself.
When all effort ceases, you’re already in the embrace of the atma.
Step out of the historic self, of your vesha. Then you’re with your true self.
Sometimes the anatomy of an atom is more complex than that of a human body. Mineral world is not so dumb as they look like.

62 - Verse 25 / Satsang

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Science cares about the truth and god is the truth. Science doesn’t care about the or a god.
Meaning of the word “veda” and “science” is the same. It is about understanding the truth.
Study of science prepares a person for vedanta.
Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle: there is nothing like certain in this creation. That comes very close to maya.
Without observer there is no modern physics. It is not objective science anymore. It is subject and object taken together.
Quantum mechanics is entirely subjective.
When you understand the truth, what is the pramana? You’re! Like instinctive understanding.
First you, then shastra.
Buddha: be a light to yourself. Light is the pramana.
You’re the awarefull being, you’re the unique instrument of knowing the truth. You’re the pramana.
Sectarian approach to god divides. Medicine, does it divide or unite? Java unites, Telugu doesn’t unite.
To some extend, technology also unites.
There are no bad questions, there are only bad answers.
Subject always changes. The object always changes. You’re the light, the background of reality.
They cover the eyes with nama.
Your body has almost infinite secrets. You identify with body and become a person, that’s why it looks silly to you. Stop ID and try to understand what it is.
Everybody wants to give you (their) god. But you’ve to find the God in yourself.
Brgu&Varuna: started examination with body, then prana, then manah. Almost there…
Cells behave as independent entities and constituents of a bigger system. Every out of 50 trillion cells is like that.
You’re not a person. You’re a bunch of 50 trillions cells. All the cells love each other and work in unison for the whole.
It is only love that keeps the cell together as an entity. And that love is brahman. But instead of realising that love is brahman, you identify with the physical entity and then get attached to physical pleasures etc.
Atma is the underlying reality behind the body, mind and life. You realize that and you’ll have seen god.
Formula for health: work hard and love all.

63 - Verse 26

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to see god is denied god. What is see must be only anatma. Therefore ishvaradarshanam is same as svaatmadarshanam.
Abiding in your self is atmadarshanam.
How to stay at home? Stop roaming around. Stop every single ID.
I’m myself or something other? You’re rarely yourself, you’re mostly that which you’re not.
In India, it is not education system, but examination system.
Allow the work to be done, but don’t ID with the profession. Just be yourself.
Look at yourself. Body, not yourself. Karmeindriyas, not the self. Go within. Jnaneindriyas. Not yourself. Go within. Manas. Not yourself. Go within. Intellect, not the self. Go within. Ego. Not yourself. Go within. The pure being. You’re at home.
Being shining as the knowing is the self. All else is the shadow.
How to stop following the shadow? Seeing the shadow as a shadow.
Self-abidance is the self-knowledge. Now who is the guru? Atma is the self-guru.
The mixing up of the real and unreal is the essence of bondage.
I’m what I’m in the bible. Bush is the body, fire is the awareness.
The courage to be yourself will come to you by abiding in yourself. Not by doing lectures or running behind someone.
A father is always insecure in one way or the other.
Time is confusion. Patience is sadhana. Have patience to abide in yourself.
In every ID there will be fear.
What is perfection. Desirelessness. When you’re perfect you don’t desire nor fear anything. Boss is coming. Who’s afraid? Who is not perfect in his work.
That perfection you’re seeking is in you. That is the atma. Ananda is perfection. Abide as I’m which is the same as I know.
You’re looking for perfection outside! By becoming a father, going to a guru, by doing a pilgrimage … I’ll become perfect. There is no perfection in the world.
You cannot live happily without perfection.
Without taking care of the inner life you focus on the outer life you’re running after the shadows. Like Rama running after the golden dear.
Having settled the outer life you have to settle the inner life. How to take care of inner life? Same as you take care of outer life - by learning. You learn yourself by being yourself, abiding in yourself.
Don’t look outside. All you need is already within you.
It is not the love for god that makes you worship god. It is your lack of self-trust.
You don’t have any trust in your self and you’ll go to god, guru, scripture…
I’m is the mahamantra. I’m is the atmasamstitih (self-abidance).
There is another way of exploring the I’m - just be the I’m. And you’ll notice that I’m is pure being. Not being this or that.
How do you know I’m? By perception? First I’m then perception. It is the origin of the perception. Inference? First I’m then can infer or study scripture …
First the pramata is there (I’m). The he holds on to the pramana because he wants to know something other. You’re the knowing element and now you want to know something that is outside. And for that you look for means to know something outside.
There can be no pramana to know the knower. If there is no pramana how can I know myself? You don’t need to know yourself. First you are and then you know that you’re and then only pramanas will come into scene. You’re aprameya.
I’m the being, I’m the knowing. The being itself shining as the knowing. And this is perfection. There is no blemish in it. No want in it. No fear in it. And the word ananda means perfection. Another name for that is God.
How to realize it? Not by talking by it, giving or taking lectures, but by abiding in yourself.
Answer has to come from memory. That’s why “who am I has no answer”. I’m is first.
“Aham” is the same as “I’m” as “OM”.

64 - Verse 26

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When you begin to see Isha within you, you’ll start to see Isha anywhere.
Popular religion is theo-centric. True religion is homo-centric.
kundala - coil. Kundalini - that which is in the shape of a coil. This comes from the serpent.
Knowing is different from abiding. When I abide in myself (in home) it doesn’t mean I know myself (the house).
I’m is the reflection. Like atmospheric light is conditioned sunlight.
Body is space, mind is time. Awarefull being is now conditioned I’m (sense of I’m).
When the body shines the world shines. You cannot have them separately.
You need not be I’m. The sense of I’m is always with you. That’s the first that happens when you wake up.
How to be in the I’m? Allow the mind to be quiet and to merge with aham. Aham is always with you. No need to search for it.
How to abide in the I’m sense. Don’t attach anything to this I’m. No effort required.
Mind is by vasanas attaching all kinds of things to the I’m sense. Stop it. Mind is attaching, body, mind, possessions … to it.
Every self-identification is misleading.
You allow the mind to decide, you’re in trouble. Mind says “You’re a teacher of vedanta”. I say “shut up”. Don’t led the dog dictate you.
The only true statement you can made about yourself is “I’m”. If you add any what (brahmana, doctor, …) “how” (generous …) you’ve made a false statement about yourself.
Abide as “I’m” and that is the window the brahman. You’re at the window, sun has to come.
The moment you identify that becomes ahamkara.
When you say OM the mind becomes silent automatically. And you’re aware in yourself.
OM, Aham, “I’m” are all the same.
Mind is happy/unhappy and you know it.

65 - Verse 27

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darshanam is jnanam. Ishvadarshanam is the same as atmajnanam. Which is same as atmanisthah.
Atmajnanam is that jnanam, that intelligence, which is free from jnanam and ajnanam, free from cognitive knowledge.
Atma is that jnanam which is free from jnanam and ajnanam.
There are two jnanas. One at the level of knowledge associated with intellect, that always goes with its opposite - ignorance. This kind of knowledge can be called information. That kind of knowledge is memory.
What we usually call knowledge is information (at the level of intellect) and memory. This knowledge is important for living in the world.
Higher knowledge is atmajnanam. And you’ll reach it only when you become free of the lower knowledge.
For reaching the atma and realizing yourself the intellect is in the way.
Unless you rise about the knowledge at the level of intellect, information and memory, you’ll remain at the lower level.
Tradition in the context of Vedanta is the cultivating of memory.
Mechanical things and everyday living relay on the knowledge, the intellect.
When you convert the knowledge into a belief it becomes a tradition.
Tradition is the cultivation of memory which is in the form of knowledge. Is it uniting or diving people? Atmajnanam is that which unites!
Vedantajnanam, when it is dividing, then it has become tradition. Intellectual.
Pramana is when you know. When the scripture is saying and you’re following it, how do you know?
When knowledge is converted into tradition, it conditions the mind into particular pattern. It divides people.
To discover the truth about yourself you must be free of tradition and free of all accumulation. Because the knowledge at the level of intellect is accumulation. Atmajnanam is not accumulation, is instant.
Putting aside knowledge means rising above, not destroying nor dismissing. When you want, you use it. But when you rise above, you enter into intelligence that is atma.
The belief prevents you from seeing it as it is.
To discover the truth you’d allow the cultivated memory to put aside. Understanding will be filtered through all the knowledge.
Learning is new, unlike cultivating memory.
Atmajnanam solves the human problem. Does tradition, accumulated knowledge, solve it?
What we need is rather mind that is free to investigate, to discover, to be creative. And that mind is no more a mind, that’s atma. Be that.
When mind is not free you become a slave to the existence, to the existing system.
You’re unhappy because you fail to see the immense riches. Because you’re not creative. Because you have burdened your mind with that knowledge which is nothing but cultivation of memory. And you call it tradition and worship it.
And with that creativeness (open mind) look within. Immense wealth. Eyesight. Heart is pumping blood. Inhalation, exhalation. Mind. Intellect with knowledge that helps you to live in this world. Your own happiness - ananda. The perfection is you. Can there be anything more than that? Look within, you’ve immense riches. God itself is sitting there as atma, making the eyes see and ears see. You’ve god heaven around you. You’ve got infinitude within you. How come you’re unhappy? You don’t have that creativeness. You don’t see the beauty of life. Every day is a fresh day. Not the same old day with one more draw in the calendar. Look at a squirrel. How happy it is to get a cone and much upon how. How happy it is to run here and there. Is it not God?
We’re very unhappy because we don’t have that creativeness. We’re burdened by knowledge.
Knowledge in your head helps you live the mechanical life in the outside world. Reach that intelligence, that is with you.

66 - Verse 27 - 28

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Particular knowledge, opposites of knowing and not knowing apply to the intellect.
Knowing and ignorance do not apply to the awareness.
Chit is free from knowledge. Knowledge if always particular, knowledge of something and that is not part of chit.
It is not knowledge of the self. It is the self that is knowledge. Self the knowing entity.
Which is first. Knower-known or knowing? First there is knowing and out of that knowing knower-known comes. Mind conditioned in an particular way is the knower, object conditioned in a particular way is the known.
Knowing is the critical thing.
I close my eyes. I’m not seeing. Is it complete? Or I know that I’m not seeing?
Not only you know but you also know that you know.
When you don’t know you know that you don’t know. You see the higher knowledge? That is the chit. That is atmajnanam.
As sakshi you’re brahman. As the knowing and not knowing entity at the intellect level you’re the jiva. It is up to you which you want to be.
You’re the knowingness without knowing anything in particular. Advaya. Because to know there must be the other.
If division is there the subject knows the object. If division is not there who knows what? There is nothing to know.
All you have to do is be the knowingness without knowing anything.
What you think you call knowledge. You think it is the serpent. More appropriately, I believe.
What you remember is not knowledge. It is memory.
Tradition is a very nice sounding name for imitation.
Witness the ego also, not only hands, legs etc. Otherwise you become the ego. Once you sense it, it is the other. You’re not the ego, you’re the sense of awareness that sense the ego.
Ego needs a desire, fear, stupidity … that’s how it survives. You feel frustrated, hurt, somebody is adversary, insulted, lost … that’s ego.
I’m taking psychological advantage from that relationship. If you find that yes, it is the ego.
Am I getting disturbed by the things that happen in the world that you’ve not understood jagat mithya.

67 - Verse 28 - 29

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To know there must be division.
There is sorrow in the life. That’s why we investigate. There is no sorrow for myself, but for the person. Suffering is caused by ajnana.
When you investigate, the suffering along with the person vanishes.
The person is but a bundle of memories. Like a spindle and in between there is nothing but space.
Did you ever hear Rama in Ramayana, Ramana Maharshi or Nisargadatta celebrate his birthday?
In India we apt the west, we don’t learn from the west. Only 7% of Indian population pays taxes. In Israel 50% of population pays taxes.
Who’s born. The chit or the person?
That knowing element and the person. There is a gulf between the two and this gulf you have to cross.
Likes and dislike is based on memory, past experience.
Master awareness to such a point that you’re aware what is without projecting like or dislike.
I’m is prior to the thought, emotion, perception. Thought creates a person.
You notice that you’re jealous. Or you notice a good emotion, like kindness. Don’t create a personality out of that. Tell yourself “I’m”.
Charity is good. If you don’t know how to put it aside, how to forget it, you’ll create a charitable person. Who asked you to make so much money in the first place?
Knowing is measuring.
Drop the future. Behave as if you didn’t have a future. Same for past. I’ve only present.
The self-knowledge is not knowledgable. It is not truly a knowledge. When you take it as knowledge you start searching. Just be the atma.
Knowledge is but a memory.
Moksha is not a motive. It’s freedom from bondage. It is a very negative thing.
Liberation is freedom from every single motive, incl. that of self-knowledge.
Suppose you seek the heaven. Then you become the person.
Do your duty, serve your family, without any desire. Allow the natural thing to happen naturally.
A true sanyasi never claims that he has given up and never claims that he’s a sanyasi also. He just remains very normal. Nothing special. For gaining the self there is nothing to be given up. The person is fictitious, false. Just rise above it.
Whatever you perceive, is not you. You’re the light.

68 - Verse 28 - 29

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Things have a shape and form. Atma is not a thing. It is the chit, that makes perception of things possible.
You’re only inadequate when you’re a projecting a desire. That’s the nature of the desire - makes you feel inadequate.
Fullness is the absence of inadequacy.
Desire makes you inadequate, makes you suffer and makes you bound in the net of time. Therefore desire is time.
You’re chit. You’re not a thing.
Don’t find reasons to remain within the forms all the time.
There is the power of life (prana) and the power of knowledge (manomaya - you think, vijnanomaya - you study, you know, the intellect). There two powers are there in you, they are not you. You have to rise above the two.
A really happy person is not conscious his possessions. The moment he becomes conscious of his possessions, the happiness is replaced by anxiety. Real happiness is not owning anything.
The more deeper in awareness you are the deeper the joy.
If there is pain and you start to cry. Your depth is just the body. If you understand the pain, your depth has done up to the intellect. Suppose there is pain, and it is bearable. Leave it and watch it - your depth is the awareness.
Pain can be used to deepen the awareness. Doing so you’ve hit the source of bliss which is the chit.
There is nothing that can make you happy except for your true self.
When a desire is fulfilled the fulfillment of the desire appears to make a person happy. No. Before the arise of another desire there is a state of desirelessness and that is bliss.
All search for happiness is misery.
True happiness is not sensation. Sensation is interaction of the mind with the outer. It is there only for a while.
When there is happiness, the person is not there.
Wife/husband should never try to extract happiness from the other but strive to make the other happy. My happiness is a contradiction.
Strive to make others happy and you’ll not know what is misery. You’ll remain in eternal bliss.

69 - Verse 29

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Generally people want to believe and not want to learn. Belief is when you don’t want to know something.
Belief prevents learning and in learning there is no belief.
In the child there is no thinking. It sees, hears, smells … Language is not there. Thinking is rupa, language is nama. Both are not there, name and rupa. Everything else is there. Therefore children are very divine.
Children loose the innocence, become clever and in that ignorant as well.
For a child there is no belief system. No thinking. No good, no evil.
If you worship the god as the other it makes no substantial difference if the god has a form or not.
In worshipping the god you’ve always been worshipping your hidden self.
They offer flowers to god. Why? Because they themselves like flowers.
God is fashioned by human mind - desires and fears, and then by human hand. And then get worshiped outside as the other. It is entirely a projection. It is a mediate god - that’s why he’s always in the heaven only.
Don’t teach dogmatic part of the religion to the children. Teach the children universal values.
Voltaire: people who believe in absurdities will not hesitate to commit atrocities.
Give up pleasure-pain cycle. Stop seeking pleasure, you’ll not know what is pain.
Rising above pleasure and pain, division between them collapses.
The moment you get your personality back the happiness has come to an end.
When happiness is divided by two, shared, it’s not diminished. It’s infinite. You cannot make parts of the infinite.
Cell is an expression of the infinitude. It can divide and produces an identical sense. It’s not a division, it is a kind of proliferation.
When you love you’re reinforcing the harmony of all the cells in your body and you’ll be healthy.

70 - Verses 29 - 30 (daivi sampat)

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Nobody can beat Hindu sects in ritualism.
1st divine quality fearlessness (abhayam): if you have fear, it means you’re a superstitious person. Fear kills the faculty of thinking, therefore you cannot have freedom.
Fearlessness is the means and is the goal.
Unless you live a life of karmayoga you cannot have a pure heart. Karmayoga is not rituals. It is the attitude and motivation with which you do the rituals - doing it, without the desire for the result thereof.
When desire is gone fearlessness comes automatically. That’s the purity of heart.
You’d give first priority to jnanam. And karma will be in next’s place. First you’d know about cooking and then cook or you know about cooking later?
You’d learn and practice to give. So whenever you give you feel happy.
Whatever you eat, see, hear should be conducive to good health.
When the use of sense-organs is moderate, mind will be mostly quiet.
Yagna - any act performed selflessly.
Most of the back-pain is psychological. Learn to sit straight and watch it, don’t rush for medicine.
Answer correctly or keep quiet. Don’t mislead. If you have to speak, tell truth only.
Don’t get angry. Frustration is anger only. Anger requires intense energy. Anger drastically changes the physiology.
Bible: I will forgive others so god can forgive me
Tho kind of freedom. Relative freedom from something particular. Absolute freedom as bliss.
Bondage is unreal. Liberation is unreal. I’m beyond both.
Nothing can ever set you free. All you have to do is to look at yourself with desireless quality.
There is ajnana and the person is result of ajnana. It is not person’s ajnana because the person is born from it. Sames applies to jnanam.

71 - Verse 30

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As the light reflects in the mind the content of the mind becomes evident.
The fundamental content of the mind is space/time.
No event, no thing, no experience is outside waking consciousness.
Who desires is the person.
Personhood destorts and destroys the reality.
Person is the doer. Kartha bhokta.
People become agitated and restless because they think to be the doer.
Doing creates a doer because of ignorance. As you identify with doing you become the doer.
Universe is full of actions but there is no doer. Wind is blowing. There is no blower. Rain is raining, there is no rainer.
As long as there is an ego, high thinking, wisdom cannot come from the source.
Cut off the supply of nutrition and it will vanish. Cut off cast, creed, … person.
Make Vedanta a personal Vedanta and you’ll defeat its whole purpose. As long as you focus on the personhood brahma will be unrealized.
This is the tapas (ahamapetakam).