M: Desires are right or wrong according to circumstances; it depends on how you look at them.

In reality both the Yogi and Bhogi follow their own nature, according to circumstances and opportunities.

These he observes, or breaks according to circumstances and necessity.

Just act according to circumstances, yet in close touch with the facts, with the reality in every situation.

Actions just happen according to circumstances.

M: They may laugh and cry according to circumstances, but inwardly they are cool and clear, watching detachedly their own spontaneous reactions.

M: Let each act according to his nature.

Maharaj: According to his belief it happens, As life before death is but imagination, so is life after.

You said that his experiences will shape themselves according to his expectations and beliefs.

M: Every teacher teaches according to his own experience.

Each seeker accepts, or invents, a method which suits him, applies it to himself with some earnestness and effort, obtains results according to his temperament and expectations, casts them into the mound of words, builds them into a system, establishes a tradition and begins to admit others into his 'school of Yoga'.

Everybody behaves according to his nature.

Memory seems to being things to the present out of the past, but all that happens does happen in the present only.

For him the right procedure is to adhere to the thought that he is the ground of all knowledge, the immutable and perennial awareness of all that happens to the senses and the mind.

Yet you cannot blame the sun for all that happens, though it is the ultimate cause.

There is aloofness and detachment as there is thirst and hunger; there is also the awareness of it all and a sense of Immense distance, as if the body and the mind and all that happens to them were somewhere far out on the horizon.

Cease to be the object and become the subject of all that happens; once having turned within, you will find yourself beyond the subject.

Just look away from all that happens in your mind and bring it to the feeling 'I am'.

You must realise yourself as the immovable, behind and beyond the movable, the silent witness of all that happens.

M: All that happens is the cause of all that happens.

Similarly, I watch all that happens, including my talking to you.

Maharaj: All that happens in your consciousness is your Guru.

All that happens, happens in and to the mind, not to the source of the 'I am'.

Happiness is both worldly and unworldly, within and beyond all that happens.

My feeling is that all that happens in space and time happens to me, that every experience is my experience every form is my form.

What I take myself to be, becomes my body and all that happens to that body becomes my mind.

You think there must be something or somebody solely responsible for all that happens.

All that happens in the universe happens to you, the silent witness.

To my own surprise, I remain as I am -- pure awareness, alert to all that happens.

With the realised man the experience: 'I am the world, the world is mine' is supremely valid -- he thinks, feels and acts integrally and in unity with all that lives.

He is one with all that lives and love is that oneness in action.

All that lives, works for protecting, perpetuating and expanding consciousness.

See yourself in all that lives and your behaviour will express your vision.

And the purpose is the good of all that lives.

Don't you see that all your problems are your body's problems -- food, clothing, shelter, family, friends, name, fame, security, survival -- all these lose their meaning the moment you realise that you may not be a mere body.

Have your being outside this body of birth and death and all your problems will be solved.

All your problems arise because you have defined and therefore limited yourself.

But if you disregard all teachings, all books, anything out into words and dive deeply within yourself and find yourself, this alone will solve all your problems and leave you in full mastery of every situation, because you will not be dominated by your ideas about the situation.

In the same way I am beyond all attributes.

He told me that I am beyond all perceivables and conceivables -- I believed.

I am beyond all dreams.

I am beyond all this'.

I am beyond all names and shapes.

I am beyond all experience, even of samadhi.

I am beyond all these.

Being the world I am not afraid of the world.

Also I am not afraid because I am nothing that can experience fear, or can be in danger.

I see things as they are, and therefore l am not afraid of them.

I am not afraid of death, because I am not afraid of life.

Q: I am not afraid of being cheated.

Q: I may go on telling myself: 'I am not the mind, I am not concerned with its problems,' but the mind remains and its problems remain just as they were.

I am not concerned with it.

I am not concerned with people's desires and fears.

Q: I am not concerned with the totality.

I am not concerned either with 'what exists' or with 'who exists'.

M: I am not concerned with the universe.

Q: I am not concerned with the inner Guru.

Therefore, I am not concerned whether I shall be reborn, or how long will the world last.

In what way does it help you to know that things are causally related -- as they may appear to be in your waking state?

But they appear to be separate, with qualities of their own.

What I appear to be to you exists only in your mind.

As long as there is a body, you appear to be embodied.

As to method, there is only one -- you must come to know yourself -- both what you appear to be and what you are.

The objects of observation are not what they appear to be and the attitudes they are met with are not what they need be.

M: What you appear to be, you are not.

When you realise that you are absolutely free to be what you consent to be, that you are what you appear to be because of ignorance or indifference, you are free to revolt and change.

They appear to be two, but on investigation they are found to be one.

Your real nature is not like what you appear to be.

Before you go further you must accept, at least as a working theory, that you are not what you appear to be, that you are under the influence of a drug.

He may appear to be angry or greedy or over-anxious about his Ashram or his family, and you may be misled by appearances, while others are not.

The person is what I appear to be to other persons.

They strive as hard and suffer as much as the Yogi, only they are not conscious of their true purpose.

When we are not conscious, it appears to us as a darkness or a blank.

There are states when you are not conscious.

Q: While we are conscious of appearances, how is it that we are not conscious that these are mere appearances?

What is really your own, you are not conscious of.

M: It is, but they are not conscious of it.

There is no separation, we are not separate selves.

M: Sir, you are not separate.

Things and people are different, but they are not separate.

M: In both, of course, because the two are not separate.

Matter and mind are not separate, they are aspects of one energy.

M: The commotion and the water are not separate.

97: Mind and the World are not Separate.

The mind and the world are not separate.

We are not separate, the real is common.

When the knower is seen as separate from the known, the witness stands alone.

Who thinks of himself as separate from the world, let him help the world.

If you imagine yourself as separate from the world, the world will appear as separate from you and you will experience desire and fear.

I do not see the world as separate from me and so there is nothing for me to desire, or fear.

M: There is no power as separate from me.

But when you look at anything as separate from you, you cannot love it for you are afraid of it.

The witness creates the person and thinks itself as separate from it.

Do not consider yourself as separate from me and we shall at once share in the common state.

Q: When I was at Sri Ramanashram, I felt Bhagwan all over the place, all-pervading, all-perceiving.

We have also spent two months at Sri Ramanashram at Tiruvannamalai.

Q: I have been at Sri Ramanashram and also I have visited Rishikesh.

M: These fourteen months at Sri Ramanashram, what did they give you?

At Sri Ramanashram did you get some instructions?

Maharaj: I am aware of being asleep.

M: Yes, I am aware of being unconscious.

M: I am aware of being awake or dreaming.

We also know that we perceive -- we are conscious and also aware of being conscious.

What you need is to be aware of being aware.

Consciousness is an attribute while awareness is not; one can be aware of being conscious, but not conscious of awareness.

This union of the seer and the seen happens when the seer becomes conscious of himself as the seer, he is not merely interested in the seen, which he is anyhow, but also interested in being interested, giving attention to attention, aware of being aware.

M: Be aware of being conscious and seek the source of consciousness.

The person may be conscious, but is not aware of being conscious.

All you need is to be aware of being, not as a verbal statement, but as an ever-present fact.

M: Awareness is not of time.

The 'I am' is a thought, while awareness is not a thought, there is no 'I am aware' in awareness.

Consciousness is an attribute while awareness is not; one can be aware of being conscious, but not conscious of awareness.

M: There can be no transition from consciousness to awareness, for awareness is not a form of consciousness.

Do you mean to say that even awareness is not real?

Q: If awareness is not an experience, how can it be realised?

M: Awareness is not limited to consciousness.

M: Perception, imagination, expectation, anticipation, illusion -- all are based on memory.

What is known takes the shape of a person, based on memory and habit.

Q: Is not all knowledge based on memory?

M: Of course the self based on memory is momentary.

What prevents you from knowing yourself as all and beyond all, is the mind based on memory.

When you understand that names and shapes are hollow shells without any content whatsoever, and what is real is nameless and formless, pure energy of life and light of consciousness, you will be at peace -- immersed in the deep silence of reality.

You could not find it, for a thing essentially restless cannot be at peace.

Once you realise your own unassailable being, you will be at peace.

Be at peace with your inner self and you will be at peace with everybody.

realise that you are not the mover, only the observer, and you will be at peace.

Realise this, and be free from the limitations of the mind.

What is supremely important is to be free from contradictions: the goal and the way must not be on different levels; life and light must not quarrel; behaviour must not betray belief.

You can only teach them to have right desires so that they may rise above them and be free from the urge to create and re- create worlds of desires, abodes of pain and pleasure.

Q: And when I realise that I am not the body, shall I be free from desire and fear?

To be free from thoughts is itself meditation.

Be free from predilections and preferences and the mind with its burden of sorrow will be no more.

We call it atma-bhakti, the love of the Supreme: or moksha-sankalpa, the determination to be free from the false.

It is only when you fully accept your responsibility for the little world in which you live and watch the process of its creation, preservation and destruction, that you may be free from your imaginary bondage.

Q: How is one to be free from the 'I'-sense?

M: You must know two things: What are you to be free from and what keeps you bound.

First be free from fear.

It is not that you must be free from 'I-am-the-body' idea first, and then realise the self.

What are you to be free from?

Obviously, you must be free from the person, you take yourself to be, for it is the idea you have of yourself that keeps you in bondage.

Realise the momentariness of being and non-being and be free from both.

Abandon all personal equations and you shall be free from fear.

The true teacher, however, will not imprison his disciple in a prescribed set of ideas, feelings and actions; on the contrary, he will show him patiently the need to be free from all ideas and set patterns of behaviour, to be vigilant and earnest and go with life wherever it takes him, not to enjoy or suffer, but to understand and learn.

Know yourself as independent and you will be free from fear and its shadows.

Q: To be free from like and dislike is a state of indifference.

When the known and the knower are seen as one, the witness becomes one with them.

When a jnani dies, he is no more, in the same sense in which a river is no more when it merges in the sea, the name, the shape, are no more, but the water remains and becomes one with the ocean.

When the mind is intensely interested, it becomes one with the object of interest -- the seer and the seen become one in seeing, the hearer and the heard become one in hearing, the lover and the loved become one in loving.

The conscious becomes one with the unconscious.

M: By my becoming one with him he becomes one with me.

Once you realise that whatever appears before you cannot be yourself, and cannot say 'I am', you are free of all your 'persons' and their demands.

As a matter of fact, before you can experience anything, there must be the sense of being.

You must melt down the old jewellery into formless gold before you can mould a new one.

Before you can think of unity, you must first create duality.

M: Before you can say: 'I am', you must be there to say it.

You must put in true worth before you can expect something real.

M: Before you can know anything directly, non-verbally, you must know the knower.

M: Before you can accept God, you must accept yourself, which is even more frightening.

M: Can you truly say you were not before you were born and can you possibly say when dead: 'Now I am no more'?

M: Before you were born you expected to live according to a plan, which you yourself had laid down.

How were you before you were born?

The state before you were born was also the state after death, if you remember.

The person was not there before you were born, nor will be there after you die.

Before you were born, you were already drugged.

Be interested in yourself beyond all experience, be with yourself, love yourself; the ultimate security is found only in self-knowledge.

I am beyond all experience, even of samadhi.

What you say goes beyond all experience.

M: There can be no experience of the Absolute as it is beyond all experience.

The jnani is beyond all experience and his memory is empty of the past.

The world is but a succession of experiences and you are what makes them conscious, and yet remain beyond all experience.

Neither your body nor mind will last.

In seeking you discover that you are neither the body nor mind, and the love of the self in you is for the self in all.

Neither your body nor mind can give you what you seek -- the being and knowing your self and the great peace that comes with it.

M: To know that you are neither body nor mind, watch yourself steadily and live unaffected by your body and mind, completely aloof, as if you were dead.

Since you are neither body nor mind, destiny has no control over you.

We are neither matter nor energy, neither body nor mind.

Having seen that you are neither the 'outer' world of perceivables, nor the 'inner' world of thinkables, that you are neither body nor mind -- just be.

M: When you know that you are neither body nor mind, you will not be swayed by them.

A man who knows that he is neither body nor mind cannot be selfish, for he has nothing to be selfish for.

Q: If I am neither the body nor mind, how am I aware of them?

The entire universe of pain is born of desire.

28: All Suffering is Born of Desire.

M: All suffering is born of desire.

To see everything as imagination, born of desire, is necessary for self-realisation.

realise that their root is in expectation born of memory and they will cease to obsess you.

Craving born of memory is also the destroyer of memory.

You can also grow like this, but you must not indulge in forecasts and plans, born of memory and anticipation.

It is only desire and fear, born of memory, that give it name and form and separate it from other experiences.

A bundle of memories and mental habits attracts attention, awareness gets focalised and a person suddenly appears.

The bundle of memories and hopes, called the 'I', imagines itself existing everlastingly and creates time to accommodate its false eternity: To be, I need no past or future.

Having seen that you are a bundle of memories held together by attachment, step out and look from the outside.

What matters supremely is sincerity, earnestness; you must really have had surfeit of being the person you are, now see the urgent need of being free of this unnecessary self-identification with a bundle of memories and habits.

It is merely a bundle of memories and habits.

A healthy body, a healthy mind live largely unperceived by their owner; only occasionally, through pain or suffering they call for attention and insight.

Just like a healthy body does not call for attention, so is the unconditioned free from experience.

Suffering is primarily a call for attention, which itself is a movement of love.

Pain is a call for attention and the penalty of carelessness.

After all, worry is mental pain and pain is invariably a call for attention.

You may call it God, or Parabrahman, or Supreme Reality, but these are names given by the mind.

Q: Yet the power to help is there and there is somebody or something that displays that power, call it God or Self or the Universal Mind.

Q: We call it God.

That which creates and sustains the world, you may call it God or providence, but ultimately you are the proof that God exists, not the other way round.

But, in a way it is the same old search for mother's love, call it God or Atma or Supreme Reality.

When you consider the wisdom and the beauty of the world, you call it God.

M: Call it love.

You may call it love, all-pervading, all-redeeming.

M: When the sense of distinction and separation is absent, you may call it love.

Call it desire, call it love -- words do not matter.

It cannot be denied.

This cannot be denied.

When you deny reality to anything, you come to a residue which cannot be denied.

This state of fearlessness is so unmistakably new, yet felt deeply as one's own, that it cannot be denied.

Whatever may be the experience, true or false, the fact of an experience taking place cannot be denied.

It is the reality of immediate experience, here and now, which cannot be denied.

What prevails is that which cannot be described, that which is beyond words.

For as long as knowledge means description in terms of what is already known, perceptual, or conceptual, there can be no such thing as self-knowledge, for what you are cannot be described, except as except as total negation.

The impersonal cannot be described in terms of good and bad.

Pure being cannot be described.

The real cannot be described, it must be experienced.

But it cannot be described in the terms of a mind that must separate and oppose in order to know.

He did not attempt to describe life -- he merely said that while life need not and cannot be described, it can be fully experienced, if the obstacles to its being experienced are removed.

M: Truth cannot be described, but it can be experienced.

But whatever can be described cannot be your self, and what you are cannot be described.

But the real self cannot be described except in terms supplied by the person, in terms of what I am not.

Q: If the unconditioned cannot be experienced, for all experience is conditioned, then why talk of it at all?

Reality is not an event, it cannot be experienced.

Not that it cannot be experienced.

M: Discontinuity is the law, when you deal with the concrete: The continuous cannot be experienced, for it has no borders.

Consciousness implies alterations, change followings change, when one thing or state comes to an end and another begins; that which has no borderline cannot be experienced in the common meaning of the word.

Q: What is the real cause of suffering?

M: The cause of suffering is in the identification of the perceiver with the perceived.

When the cause of suffering is seen and removed, suffering ceases.

The cause of suffering is dependence and independence is the remedy.

M: Selfishness is the cause of suffering.

And it is in the very nature of a mistake to cease to be, when seen.

M: You can only cease to be -- as you seem to be now.

Maybe you are right and I am wrong, but how can I cease to be what I feel I am?

Cease to be the object and become the subject of all that happens; once having turned within, you will find yourself beyond the subject.

You realise that the person you became at birth and will cease to be at death is temporary and false.

You cease to be a Mr-so-and-so, busy about his own affairs.

What is, can cease to be; what is not, can come to be; but what neither is nor is not, but on which being and non-being depend, is unassailable; know yourself to be the cause of desire and fear, itself free from both.

Withdraw from it, ignore it, go beyond, and it will cease to be.

You never cease to be a man because you dream to be a tiger.

Even these, once detachment sets in, move away from the centre of consciousness and happen spontaneously and effortlessly.

Q: What then is in the centre of consciousness?

Like a hole in the paper is both in the paper and yet not of paper, so is the supreme state in the very centre of consciousness, and yet beyond consciousness.

When you know yourself as a centre of consciousness, the world appears as the ocean of the mind.

Once the world comes into being, all you say may be so.

Eternally the Great Heart beats and at each beat a new universe comes into being.

In consciousness it comes into being, in consciousness it lasts and into pure consciousness it dissolves.

Consciousness comes into being and goes out of being.

Where clarity and detachment predominate, the witness-consciousness comes into being.

But when the discriminative mind comes into being and creates distinctions, pleasure and pain arise.

What is seedless and rootless, what does not sprout and grow, flower and fruit, what comes into being suddenly and in full glory, mysteriously and marvellously, you may call that 'god'.

Watch your mind, how it comes into being, how it operates.

Surely the world comes into being first.

The world comes into being only when you are born in a body.

The person comes into being when there is a basis for it, an organism, a body.

The Supreme (paramakash) imparts reality to whatever comes into being.

The moment you say: 'I am', the entire universe comes into being along with its creator.

M: Neither conscious nor unconscious, I am telling you from experience.

M: It is neither conscious nor unconscious.

But a jnani is aware of himself as neither conscious nor unconscious, but purely aware, a witness to the three states of the mind and their contents.

Q: How do you come to know a state of pure being which is neither conscious nor unconscious?

M: Neither conscious nor unconscious.

M: I am neither conscious nor unconscious, I am beyond the mind and its various states and conditions.

M: I am what I am, neither with form nor formless, neither conscious nor unconscious.

M: I am conscious and unconscious, both conscious and unconscious, neither conscious nor unconscious -- to all this I am witness -- but really there is no witness, because there is nothing to be a witness to.

Awareness is absolute, consciousness is relative to its content; consciousness is always of something.

To me consciousness is always focalised, centred, individualised, a person.

Consciousness is always of change.

Consciousness is always of obstacles; when there are no obstacles, one goes beyond it.

Consciousness is always of movement, of change.

Q: Consciousness is always in movement -- it is an observable fact.

Q: The desire for pleasure, the fear of pain, both are states of distress.

Give up the desire for pleasure and you will not even know what is pain.

Q: I find that I am totally motivated by desire for pleasure and fear of pain.

The obstacles to the clear perception of one's true being are desire for pleasure and fear of pain.

Q: All I know is desire for pleasure and fear of pain.

The perennial desire for pleasure is the reflection of the timeless harmony within.

Your concern with future is due to fear of pain and desire for pleasure, to the jnani all is bliss: he is happy with whatever comes.

M: Fear of pain, desire for pleasure.

I am fully conscious, but since no desire or fear enters my mind, there is perfect silence.

Without desire or fear he enjoys it, as it happens.

There is nothing I desire or fear -- how can there be a pattern?

I am free of desire or fear, because I do not remember the past, or imagine the future.

Whatever may be the desire or fear, don't dwell upon it.

Whatever you think about with desire or fear appears before you as real.

Look at it without desire or fear and it does lose substance.

M: Whenever a thought or emotion of desire or fear comes to your mind, just turn away from it.

Of course, some memories are needed to identify and guide the body and such memories do remain, but there is no attachment left to the body as such; it is no longer the ground for desire or fear.

When there is also self-identification with the object, caused by desire or fear, such a state is called a person.

When you happen to desire or fear, it is not the desire or fear that are wrong and must go, but the person who desires and fears.

There is no point where a desire or fear can hook on.

Even these could not have caused your birth without your own desire to be born.

Q: Even the desire to be free of desire?

Don't be theoretical about it, give time to thought and consideration; if you desire to be free, neglect not the nearest step to freedom.

The desire to be is the strongest of all desires and will go only on the realisation of your true nature.

Q: You mean to say that I become God merely by giving up the desire to become God?

M: The very desire to be ready means that the Guru had come and the flame is lighted.

The desire to be the particular makes you into a person with all its personal past and future.

What is the basic difference between us?

The only difference between us is that I am aware of my natural state, while you are bemused.

Questioner: There is a basic difference between us.

Maybe this is the outstanding difference between us.

Yet I see no difference between us, except that you are imagining things, while I do not.

Q: The only difference between us seems to be that while I keep on saying that I do not know my real self, you maintain that you know it well; is there any other difference between us?

M: There is no difference between us; nor can I say that I know myself, I know that I am not describable nor definable.

M: That which does not change with time.

What changes is not real, what is real does not change.

Now, what is it in you that does not change?

M: The mind must learn that beyond the moving mind there is the background of awareness, which does not change.

You are what does not change.

The screen is there -- it does not change.

It does not change -- it is always the same -- it appears to be there on its own -- something strange and alien.

There are numberless persons small and big and very big, who, through identification, imagine themselves as acting, but it does not change the fact that the world of action (mahadakash) is one single whole in which all depends on, and affects all.

Q: Calling it a dream does not change the situation.

Nor can you call it alive, for it does not change.

Awareness is itself and does not change with the event.

M: Man does not change much over the ages.

Centuries roll on, but the human problem does not change -- the problem of suffering and the ending of suffering.

Ignorance of this fact does not change it.

Call it what you like, it does not change the fact.

You cannot be conscious of what does not change.

How are we to understand your statement that the world and all it includes does not exist, as far as you are concerned.

Q: So liberation, in my sense of the word, does not exist?

When you tell us that our world simply does not exist, there is no common ground for discussion.

M: Your personal universe does not exist by itself.

You need not free yourself of a world that does not exist, except in your own imagination!

M: That which does not exist cannot have a cause.

To him your questions about obedience and discipline do not make sense, for in his eyes the person you take yourself to be does not exist, your questions are about a non-existing person.

What exists for you does not exist for him.

This problem of things, good and evil in themselves, does not exist in my world.

You can say that ignorance does not exist, for the moment it is seen it is no more.

To say that what I am not conscious of does not exist, is altogether wrong.

The name does not matter, but the fact does.

M: It is there, but it does not matter.

Maharaj: What is done under pressure of society and circumstances does not matter much, for it is mostly mechanical, mere reacting to impacts.

It does not matter much if you do not accept him as your Guru and are satisfied with his company only.

M: Your disbelief does not matter.

Here and there you may forget, it does not matter.

It is totally super-imposed and its disappearance just does not matter.

The world of mind and matter, of names and shapes, continues, but it does not matter to me at all.

It does not matter much who is the teacher -- they all wish you well.

M: Distance does not matter.

The ordinary man is personally concerned, he counts his risks and chances, while the jnani remains aloof, sure that all will happen as it must; and it does not matter much what happens, for ultimately the return to balance and harmony is inevitable.

According to you, reality consists of three expanses: The expanse of matter-energy (mahadakash), the expanse of consciousness (chidakash) and of pure spirit (paramakash).

I may perceive the world just like you, but you believe to be in it, while I see it as an iridescent drop in the vast expanse of consciousness.

Primary is the infinite expanse of consciousness, the eternal possibility, the immeasurable potential of all that was, is, and will be.

To myself I am the infinite expanse of consciousness in which innumerable persons emerge and disappear in endless succession.

You would have noticed that all advice to the outer is in the form of negations: don't, stop, refrain, forego, give up, sacrifice, surrender, see the false as false.

For this you must see the false as false (viveka) and reject it (vairagya).

Truth does not assert itself, it is in the seeing of the false as false and rejecting it.

The entire approach is through understanding, which is in the seeing of the false as false.

It is the mind that creates the unreal and it is the mind that sees the false as false.

Q: I understood that the experience of the real follows seeing the false as false.

The acceptance of the unreal as real is the obstacle; to see the false as false and abandon the false brings reality into being.

Q: The desire for pleasure, the fear of pain, both are states of distress.

Q: I find that I am totally motivated by desire for pleasure and fear of pain.

The obstacles to the clear perception of one's true being are desire for pleasure and fear of pain.

Q: All I know is desire for pleasure and fear of pain.

On the other hand, activity is based on desire and fear, on longing to possess and enjoy, on fear of pain and annihilation.

It is this fear of pain that holds together our social, economic and political institutions.

Your concern with future is due to fear of pain and desire for pleasure, to the jnani all is bliss: he is happy with whatever comes.

M: Fear of pain, desire for pleasure.

You will soon find that it is the mind, goaded by fear of pain, that asks the question.

When the centre of selfishness is no longer, all desires for pleasure and fear of pain cease; one is no longer interested in being happy; beyond happiness there is pure intensity, inexhaustible energy, the ecstasy of giving from a perennial source.

The entire field of consciousness is only as a film, or a speck, in 'I am'.

What in your case occupies the entire field of consciousness, is a mere speck in mine.

It is there in the field of consciousness, but you are not the field and its contents, nor even the knower of the field.

All you need to do is to cease taking yourself to be within the field of consciousness.

You will be a fully awakened witness of the field of consciousness.

Even then the work on the blacked out levels goes on, outside the field of consciousness.

this habit of referring to a false centre must be done away with, the notion 'I see', 'I feel', 'I think', 'I do', must disappear from the field of consciousness; what remains when the false is no more, is real.

You will have to explore the entire field of consciousness and go beyond it.

Once you have understood that you are nothing perceivable or conceivable, that whatever appears in the field of consciousness cannot be your self, you will apply yourself to the eradication of all self-identification, as the only way that can take you to a deeper realisation of your self.

It is as if an opening in the mind through which the mind is flooded with light.

The window opens and the room is flooded with light.

Open the shutter of the mind, and it will be flooded with light.

M: Remove the speck and your eyes will be flooded with light.

One can function rightly, responding well and fully to whatever happens, without having to bring it into the focus of awareness.

It sheds its radiance on all that comes within its focus of awareness and nothing is excluded.

M: The fact of pain is easily brought within the focus of awareness.

M: Keep the 'I am' in the focus of awareness, remember that you are, watch yourself ceaselessly and the unconscious will flow into the conscious without any special effort on your part.

I was free from desire and fear.

M: The outer can help by keeping quiet and free from desire and fear.

Q: And when I realise that I am not the body, shall I be free from desire and fear?

Once you can say with confidence born from direct experience: 'I am the world, the world is myself', you are free from desire and fear on one hand and become totally responsible for the world on the other.

And I do not know how to get free from fear.

First be free from fear.

Abandon all personal equations and you shall be free from fear.

Know yourself as independent and you will be free from fear and its shadows.

Q: If being happy is the same as being free from fear and worry, cannot it be said that absence of trouble is the cause of happiness?

Q: Freedom from desire is not the freedom I want.

Freedom from desire means this: the compulsion to satisfy is absent.

Desiring a state of freedom from desire will not set you free.

Questioner: On all sides I hear that freedom from desires and inclinations is the first condition of self-realisation.

Any attempt to do something about your problems is bound to fail, for what is caused by desire can be undone only in freedom from desire.

Freedom from desires is bliss.

This freedom from desire and fear remained with me since then.

M: You gain freedom from desire and fear, which are entirely due to wrong uses of the mind.

Dispassion, detachment, freedom from desire and fear, from all self-concern, mere awareness -- free from memory and expectation -- this is the state of mind to which discovery can happen.

Do not be afraid of freedom from desire and fear.

Q: Freedom from desire is not the freedom I want.

Freedom from desire means this: the compulsion to satisfy is absent.

Desiring a state of freedom from desire will not set you free.

Questioner: On all sides I hear that freedom from desires and inclinations is the first condition of self-realisation.

Any attempt to do something about your problems is bound to fail, for what is caused by desire can be undone only in freedom from desire.

Freedom from desires is bliss.

This freedom from desire and fear remained with me since then.

M: You gain freedom from desire and fear, which are entirely due to wrong uses of the mind.

Dispassion, detachment, freedom from desire and fear, from all self-concern, mere awareness -- free from memory and expectation -- this is the state of mind to which discovery can happen.

Do not be afraid of freedom from desire and fear.

Give up all questions except one: 'Who am I?

M: Give up all questions except one: 'Who am l'?

Give up all ideas about yourself and simply be.

You need not set it right -- it will set itself right, as soon as you give up all concern with the past and the future and live entirely in the now.

55: Give up All and You Gain All.

Give up all and you gain all.

If you want to make real progress you must give up all idea of personal attainment.

Q: Does it mean that I must give up all idea of an active life?

Give up all working for a future, concentrate totally on the now, be concerned only with your response to every movement of life as it happens.

Let us give up all means and their results, for the results are bound by the means; let us put the question anew; can truth be found?

As long as you have all sorts of ideas about yourself, you know yourself through the mist of these ideas; to know yourself as you are, give up all ideas.

Give your heart and mind to it, think of nothing else.

To know, to do, to discover, or to create you must give your heart to it -- which means attention.

M: You have two ways: you can give your heart and mind to self-discovery, or you accept my words on trust and act accordingly.

M: Give your heart and mind to brooding over the 'I am', what is it, how is it, what is its source, its life, its meaning.

You have to give your heart and mind to these things and brood over them repeatedly.

Q: How does one go beyond consciousness into awareness?

To go beyond consciousness is the supreme state.

The very desire to go beyond consciousness is still in consciousness.

M: It has no answer in consciousness and, therefore, helps to go beyond consciousness.

To go beyond them you must go beyond consciousness, which is possible only when you look at consciousness as something that happens to you and not in you, as something external, alien, superimposed.

How to go beyond consciousness?

the only thing you can do is to go beyond it.

You must conquer your own mind and for this you must go beyond it.

Their approach is negative; they pinpoint the unreal and thus go beyond it into the real.

Go beyond it altogether.

Go beyond it.

Once you have grasped the truth that the world is full of suffering, that to be born is a calamity, you will find the urge and the energy to go beyond it.

M: While looking with the mind, you cannot go beyond it.

When it is quiet, you can go beyond it.

You will have to explore the entire field of consciousness and go beyond it.

The mind can operate with terms of its own making, it just cannot go beyond itself.

M: Meditation is a deliberate attempt to pierce into the higher states of consciousness and finally go beyond it.

The mind cannot go beyond itself by itself.

Now, do I go to sleep or does inadvertence -- characteristic of the sleeping state -- come to me?

Remove the light of awareness, go to sleep or swoon away -- and the person disappears.

If you do not want to suffer, don't go to sleep.

Do you turn blank, or go to sleep?

How ready and willing you are to go to sleep, how peaceful, free and happy you are when asleep!

Each time you go to sleep you do so without the least certainty of waking up and yet you accept the risk.

After all, it subsides each time you go to sleep.

First realise that your problem exists in your waking state only, that however painful it is, you are able to forget it altogether when you go to sleep.

M: You face it most cheerfully, when you go to sleep!

M: God is not running the world.

God is not such a fool.

What we call the will of God is not a capricious whim of a playful deity, but the expression of an absolute necessity to grow in love and wisdom and power, to actualise the infinite potentials of life and consciousness.

M: God is not only true and good, he is also beautiful (satyam-shivam-sundaram).

Q: But God is not a notion!

Q: Krishnamurti says that Guru is not needed.

The Guru is not very much concerned with the superficialities of the disciple's life.

M: Similarly, the time-bound Guru is not for ever.

The inner Guru is not committed to non-violence.

M: Of course, when there is total surrender, complete relinquishment of all concern with one's past, presents and future, with one's physical and spiritual security and standing, a new life dawns, full of love and beauty; then the Guru is not important, for the disciple has broken the shell of self-defence.

All happens by itself.

33: Everything Happens by Itself.

M: From my point of view everything happens by itself, quite spontaneously.

Therefore I keep on saying that all happens by itself.

In my world nothing is pushed about, all happens by itself.

M: All happens by itself.

But to say 'I do' is altogether false, because there is nobody who does; all happens by itself, including the idea of being a doer.

Once you realise that all happens by itself, (call it destiny, or the will of God or mere accident), you remain as witness only, understanding and enjoying, but not perturbed.

The rest happens by itself, and to a large extent unconsciously.

All happens by itself.

33: Everything Happens by Itself.

M: From my point of view everything happens by itself, quite spontaneously.

Therefore I keep on saying that all happens by itself.

In my world nothing is pushed about, all happens by itself.

M: All happens by itself.

But to say 'I do' is altogether false, because there is nobody who does; all happens by itself, including the idea of being a doer.

Once you realise that all happens by itself, (call it destiny, or the will of God or mere accident), you remain as witness only, understanding and enjoying, but not perturbed.

The rest happens by itself, and to a large extent unconsciously.

Others -- that it has no being whatsoever.

The person has no being in itself; it is a reflection in the mind of the witness, the 'I am', which again is a mode of being.

45: What Comes and Goes has no Being.

What comes and goes has no being.

I have no being outside it, as it has no being without me.

M: Surely, what has no being is false.

M: What contradicts itself, has no being.

Q: If all that passes has no being, then the universe has no being either.

Of course the universe has no being.

Maharaj: From the highest point of view the world has no cause.

The world has no cause.

Freedom from sorrow has no cause and, therefore, cannot be destroyed.

It has no cause and serves no purpose.

All I can say is that true happiness has no cause and what has no cause is immovable.

In your world the unspoken has no existence.

Your world is a word structure only, it has no existence'.

The world has no existence apart from you.

By itself it has no existence.

I too was under the illusion of having been born, but my Guru made me see that birth and death are mere ideas -- birth is merely the idea: 'I have a body'.

As if she never forgave me my crime of having been born, she made me feel guilty of being alive.

Coming back to the idea of having been born.

You are accusing me of having been born -- I plead not guilty!

M: One who believes himself as having been born is very much afraid of death.

You are telling me such wonderful things about myself; according to you I am eternal, omnipresent, omniscient, supremely happy, creator, preserver and destroyer of all there is, the source of all life, the heart of being, the lord and the beloved of every creature.

By all means be devoted to the real, the infinite, the eternal heart of being.

And beyond all, and pervading all, is the heart of being which beats steadily -- manifested-unmanifested; manifested-unmanifested (saguna-nirguna).

Whoever is puzzled by his very existence as a conscious being and earnestly wants to find his own source, can grasp the ever-present sense of 'I am' and dwell on it assiduously and patiently, till the clouds obscuring the mind dissolve and the heart of being is seen in all its glory.

Q: I am afraid.

I am afraid of falling asleep over my so-called absolute certainties.

I am afraid of cheating myself.

Q: I am afraid.

I am afraid of Mother Nature who wants me to grow, procreate and die.

Q: I am afraid of dying, not of death itself.

Q: I am afraid of my own mind.

Q: I am afraid of mistakes.

Q: I am in a world which I do not understand and therefore, I am afraid of it.

Of course, I am alone for I am all.

M: Being nothing, I am all.

I am all and all is me.

I do not identify myself with anybody in particular, for I am all -- both the particular and the universal.

M: By focussing the mind on 'I am', on the sense of being, 'I am so-and-so' dissolves; "I am a witness only" remains and that too submerges in 'I am all'.

M: I am all.

I am all.

Q: I approve of austerity, but in practice I am all for luxury.

Q: I am not talking of pleasing, but I am all for helping others.

'I am all there is' too is an experience equally valid.

On the contrary, I am all yours, eat me and drink me.

Q: For the person I am all this seems impossible.

There is nothing I feel separate from, hence I am all.

When the 'I am myself' goes, the 'I am all' comes.

When the 'I am all' goes, 'I am' comes.

I am all front, no back!

Similarly, I know that I am all.

I do not need to keep on repeating: 'I am all, I am all'.

Q: I am asking.

Q: I am asking you a question and you are answering.

What I am asking is whether liberation is compatible with the survival of the body.

Q: The fact is that here and now I am asking you: when did the feeling 'I am the body' arise?

Q: It is not for the training that I am asking just now, but for its results.

Q: I am asking for some hints only.

Q: I am asking a simple question: there are about four billion people in the world and they are all bound to die.

What I am asking you to do is to put an end to it, to wake up and see things as they are.

Q: I am asking about the immediate, the transitory, the appearance.

All I am asking is: does Maharaj agree with me that Yoga implies violence?

The only difference between us is that I am aware of my natural state, while you are bemused.

Q: Intellectually, verbally, I am aware that all is transient.

Maharaj: I am aware of being asleep.

M: Yes, I am aware of being unconscious.

M: I am aware of being awake or dreaming.

I am aware of the general purpose, but not of each movement in detail.

If I am blind from birth and you tell me that you know things without touching them, while I must touch to know, I am aware that I am blind without knowing what does it mean to see.

The 'I am' is a thought, while awareness is not a thought, there is no 'I am aware' in awareness.

When I am aware, I do not really live in the now, but only in the past.

Desire and imagination create the world and intelligence reconciles the two and causes a sense of harmony and peace To me it all happens; I am aware, yet unaffected.

Reflected awareness, the sense 'I am aware' is the witness, while pure awareness is the essence of reality.

I am aware, for I imagine nothing.

If you say 'I am aware', it only means: 'I am conscious of thinking about being aware'.

Whatever you can know with your mind is of the mind, not you; about yourself you can only say: 'I am, I am aware, I like It'.

I am beyond time.

In the same way I am beyond all attributes.

The universe is all names and forms, based on qualities and their differences, while I am beyond.

I may be quite certain that I am beyond time and space, and yet unable to locate myself at will at some point of time and space.

He told me that I am beyond all perceivables and conceivables -- I believed.

I am beyond the mind, whatever its state, pure or impure.

Awareness is my nature; ultimately I am beyond being and non-being.

Q: By what sign shall l know that I am beyond sin and virtue?

I am beyond it as Being.

I am beyond all dreams.

But I am beyond consciousness and, therefore, in consciousness I cannot say what I am.

I am beyond.

I am beyond both.

I am beyond all this'.

M: I am neither conscious nor unconscious, I am beyond the mind and its various states and conditions.

I did not condition my mind by thinking: 'I am God, I am wonderful, I am beyond'.

I am beyond all names and shapes.

But I am beyond love even.

But I am beyond both.

I am beyond all experience, even of samadhi.

I am beyond all these.

Q: If I am beyond the mind, how can I change myself?

I am beyond, though it is not easy to explain how one can be neither conscious, nor unconscious, but just beyond.

I cannot say that I am in God or I am God; God is the universal light and love, the universal witness: I am beyond the universal even.

This I try to express my saying that I am beyond the mind.

M: The 'I am' is at the root of all appearance and the permanent link in the succession of events that we call life; but I am beyond the 'I am'.

And since time and space are in the mind, I am beyond time and space, eternal and omnipresent.

I am beyond miracles -- I am absolutely normal.

I am beyond both.

Q: Can I say that I am not what I am conscious of, nor am I consciousness itself?

I found that I am conscious and happy absolutely and only by mistake I thought I owed beingconsciousness- bliss to the body and the world of bodies.

Q: All my waking and dreaming I am conscious of myself.

Q: But I am conscious of my question.

M: On the contrary, I am conscious of not having a body.

M: Of course I am conscious, and fully aware of it.

M: I am conscious and unconscious, both conscious and unconscious, neither conscious nor unconscious -- to all this I am witness -- but really there is no witness, because there is nothing to be a witness to.

The 'I am' is the only changeless factor I am conscious of; how can it be false?

If you say 'I am aware', it only means: 'I am conscious of thinking about being aware'.

M: I am dead already.

When you see me alive, I am dead.

I am dead to the world, I want nothing, not even to live.

They were before I was born and shall be there when I am dead.

M: I am dead already.

M: But I am dead already, or, rather, neither alive nor dead.

I am free of memories and anticipations, unconcerned with what I am and what I am not.

Anxiety and hope are born of imagination -- I am free of both.

I am not aware of any world separate from myself, which I am free to save or not to save.

Q: Of course I am free to desire, but I am not free to act on my desire.

M: When I say I am free, I merely state a fact.

I am free from all description and identification.

I am free from being a percept, or a concept.

Void of all predilections, I am free to love.

Q: If I am free, why am I in a body?

I am free of desire or fear, because I do not remember the past, or imagine the future.

The very notion of I am free of 'I am' is an absurdity.

Q: I am free to choose my limitations.

All I need is to know that I am free and happy.

Q: Once I know how to face pain, I am free of it, not afraid of it, and therefore happy.

Then words 'I am man', or 'I am God' have no meaning.

To sit in a corner all by oneself and keep on repeating: 'I am God, God I am', appears to be plain madness.

I did not condition my mind by thinking: 'I am God, I am wonderful, I am beyond'.

Q: Can I think 'I am God'?

I cannot say that I am in God or I am God; God is the universal light and love, the universal witness: I am beyond the universal even.

If I am the sole creator of all this, then I am God indeed!

But if I am God, why do I appear so small and helpless to myself?

Q: If I am God, then the world I create must be true.

He told me I am nothing but my self and I believed him.

Also I am not afraid because I am nothing that can experience fear, or can be in danger.

I am nothing, and nothing is afraid of no thing.

God is all that is great and wonderful; I am nothing, have nothing, can do nothing.

No thing is me, so I am nothing.

Wisdom says: 'I am nothing' Between the two my life flows.

But what I have discovered by the grace of my Guru is: I am nothing that can be pointed at.

The 'I am this' is not.

The personality, based on self-identification, on imagining oneself to be something: 'I am this, I am that', continues, but only as a part of the objective world.

Our usual attitude is of 'I am this'.

The 'I am this' is not.

'I am this' is the person.

It is the mind bewildered by wrong ideas, addicted to thinking: 'I am this' 'I am that', that fears loss and craves gain and suffers when frustrated.

It is right to say 'I am', but to say 'I am this', 'I am that' is a sign of not enquiring, not examining, of mental weakness or lethargy.

M: The idea 'I am this body' dies; the witness does not.

There is no 'I am this'.

The 'I am this', 'I am that' are imaginary.

'I am this, I am that' is dream, while pure 'I am' has the stamp of reality on it.

It is unreal when we say: 'I am this, I am that'.

M: There is only one mind, which swarms with ideas; 'I am this, I am that, this is mine, that is mine'.

M: When you are bound by the illusion: 'I am this body', you are merely a point in space and a moment in time.

M: The person, the 'I am this body, this mind, this chain of memories, this bundle of desires and fears' disappears, but something you may call identity, remains.

Q: So, all I can do is to stay confused?

Q: I can do neither.

Q: I just do not know how much I can do for the world.

All I can do, is to try.

Q: And so, I can do as I like and put the blame on some universal power?

I feel I can do everything I can think of, only I do not know how.

If I can do nothing more than give life and true culture to a few children -- good enough; though my heart goes out to every child, I cannot reach all.

What is it I can do which is neither sterile nor violent?

Questioner: I am a Frenchman by birth and domicile and since about ten years I have been practicing Yoga.

Q: I have been barren for the last two years, desolate and empty and often was I praying for death to come.

Q: So far I have been following you.

Q: I have been at Sri Ramanashram and also I have visited Rishikesh.

Q: I have been wandering all over India, meeting many Gurus and learning in driblets several Yogas.

Questioner: I have been moving from place to place investigating the various Yogas available for practice and I could not decide which will suit me best.

I know it rained, but I am not affected.

Q: I know it is not possible!

I know it, but you don't.

I know it for certain and you do not.

I know it and admit it and only ask you -- how is it done?

I know it is a painful business.

I know it and I can convey it, but only if you are open to it.

Q: I am what I know myself to be.

In what way do I know myself as the Supreme?

Q: But how can I know myself?

I just blink, for I know myself to be a tiny little bundle of desires and fears, a bubble of suffering, a transient flash of consciousness in an ocean of darkness.

Once I know myself and what I stand for, I do not need to check on myself all the time.

I know myself and I find no life nor death in me, only pure being -- not being this or that, but just being.

I know myself as I am; as I appeared or will appear is not within my experience.

M: I know myself as I am in reality.

It is enough if I know myself.

I know myself by being myself.

M: I know myself as I am -- timeless, spaceless, causeless.

To say: 'I know myself' is a contradiction in terms for what is 'known' cannot be 'myself'.

Q: What proof will I have that I know myself correctly?

Q: If I know myself, shall I not desire and fear?

Q: What do you mean by saying: I know myself as I am?

M: There is no difference between us; nor can I say that I know myself, I know that I am not describable nor definable.

M: I know nothing about it all and see no difference between you and me.

M: I know nothing about miracles, and I wonder whether nature admits exceptions to her laws, unless we agree that everything is a miracle.

Of being before birth and after death I know nothing.

Now I know nothing, for all knowledge is in dream only and not valid.

M: The scriptures say so, but I know nothing about it.

Q: I know nothing about being the cause of the universe.

I found myself desiring and knowing less and less, until I could say in utter astonishment: 'I know nothing, I want nothing.

I know nothing about it.

Q: I know nothing of it.

M: I look at it through the eyes of God and find that all is well.

Q: When I look at myself, I find I am several persons fighting among themselves for the use of the body.

Questioner: As I look at you, you seem to be a poor man with very limited means, facing all the problems of poverty and old age, like everybody else.

I find that somehow, by shifting the focus of attention, I become the very thing I look at and experience the kind of consciousness it has; I become the inner witness of the thing.

You are inside the cloud, while I look at.

As I look at you, you all seem asleep, dreaming up words of your own.

Whatever happens, I must be there to witness it.

Q: I must be lacking energy.

Q: I must be in the right mood to examine myself fruitfully.

To know myself I must be away from myself.

Q: To do what you tell me I must be ceaselessly aware.

Q: I must begin with some absolute truth.

To be, I must be somebody.

Surely I must bend them to my desire.

To be human I must be compassionate absolutely.

To be truly human I must be self-less.

If I am active, I must be violent.

I see it as appearing in consciousness, which is the totality of the known in the immensity of the unknown.

If it is my mind that projects the picture, why need I open my eyes to see a lovely flower and with eyes closed I see it vaguely?

As I see it, you all are on a stage performing.

As I see it, Bhoga is the better of the two.

As I see it, there is really nothing of the kind.

I may perceive the world just like you, but you believe to be in it, while I see it as an iridescent drop in the vast expanse of consciousness.

Whatever state I am in, I see it as a state of mind to be accepted as it is.

Only I see it as it is, while you don't.

As I see it, two body-minds exchange symbolic noises.

As I see it, it is all day-dreaming.

I shall become a nobody, a nothing !

The sum total of the past becomes the 'I was', the hoped for future becomes the 'I shall be' and life is a constant effort of crossing over from what 'I was' to what 'I shall be'.

Is it an illusion, like 'I was' and 'I shall be', or is there something real about it?

Is there something real, something lasting about the 'I am' in distinction from the 'I was', or 'I shall be', which change with time, as added memories create new expectations?

Maharaj: The present 'I am' is as false as the 'I was' and 'I shall be'.

Q: If you could tell me what I shall become, it may help me to watch over my development.

Therefore, I am not concerned whether I shall be reborn, or how long will the world last.

Q: By his grace I shall be made happy, powerful and peaceful.

Q: Well, I admit that I am, I was, I shall be; at least from birth to death.

Now, please do not tell me that it is because I am not earnest enough and I should be more earnest!

Q: If nature is in the mind and the mind is my own, I should be able to control nature, which is not really the case.

I did not reason out that I should be free -- I found myself free -- unexpectedly, without the least effort.

Q: If I project the world, I should be able to change it.

You said that before I was born I was one with the pure being of reality; if so, who decided that I should be born?

I should be thankful for some competent advice.

Kindly tell me what am I to do?

What am I to do?

Q: If what I am, as I am, the person I take myself to be, cannot be happy, then what am I to do?

What am I to do?

Q: What am I to do?

What am I to do?

Q: After I have heard you, what am I to do?

What am I to do?

But what am I to do now?

What am I to do?

Q: Once I give up asking questions, what am I to do?

But what am I to do to realise it as a fact, to go beyond into the changeless, wordless Reality?

Q: Then, what am I to do?

How am I to get what I want?

Q: Where am I to get the energy?

Q: How am I to get a true answer?

Q: How am I to get such stainless mirror?

Q: Where am I to get the courage to act without conviction?

Q: How am I to get rid of the false and secure the real?

Q: I was born, I shall die.

I am told I was born.

My mother died when I was born.

From the day I was born till the day I die, pain and pleasure will weave the pattern of my life.

Q: I was born, I have grown, I shall die.

They were before I was born and shall be there when I am dead.

Q: But I was born as a body, in a body and shall die with the body, as a body.

M: I was born among meat-eating people and my children are eating meat.

Was there a pattern laid down before I was born by which I had to live my life?

Before I was born, did my inner self decide the details of my life, or was it entirely accidental and at the mercy of heredity and circumstances?

Questioner: My friend is a German and I was born in England from French parents.

Take the idea 'I was born'.

I cried when I was born and I shall die laughing.

You said that before I was born I was one with the pure being of reality; if so, who decided that I should be born?

Questioner: I was born in the United States, and the last fourteen months I have spent in Sri Ramanashram; now I am on my way back to the States where my mother is expecting me.

M: By being free from all desire and fear, from the very idea of being a person.

Take for example, the idea of being born.

M: Give up the idea of being what you think yourself to be and there will be no gap.

Even the idea of being man or woman, or even human, should be discarded.

Give up the idea of being the body and face the question: Who am l?

But to say 'I do' is altogether false, because there is nobody who does; all happens by itself, including the idea of being a doer.

Give up the idea of being a person, that is all.

Your ideas about yourself change from day to day and from moment to moment.

Get rid of all ideas about yourself, even of the idea that you are God.

Give up all ideas about yourself and simply be.

Abandon all ideas about yourself and you will find yourself to be the pure witness, beyond all that can happen to the body or the mind.

As long as you have all sorts of ideas about yourself, you know yourself through the mist of these ideas; to know yourself as you are, give up all ideas.

Remove and abandon your wrong ideas about yourself and there it is, in all its glory.

M: It is only because you identify yourself with them.

M: Your mind projects a structure and you identify yourself with it.

It would be a grievous mistake to identify yourself with something external.

Don't identify yourself with the world and you will not suffer.

Again you identify yourself with your mind, in this case a well-behaved and in every way an exemplary mind.

M: Don't identify yourself with an idea.

You identify yourself with everything so easily, I find it impossible.

Without this realisation you identify yourself with the externals, like the body, mind, society, nation, humanity, even God or the Absolute.

Do not identify yourself with time, do not ask anxiously: 'what next, what next?

M: You identify yourself with your desires and become their slave.

As long as you identify yourself with them you are bound to suffer; realise your independence and remain happy.

When you desire and fear, and identify yourself with your feelings, you create sorrow and bondage.

It is the illusion of time that makes you talk of causality.

Go beyond the illusion of time.

Timelessness is beyond the illusion of time, it is not an extension in time.

the succession of transient moments creates the illusion of time, but the timeless reality of pure being is not in movement, for all movement requires a motionless background.

The mind, by its very nature, divides and opposes.

The self by its very nature delights in everything and its energies flow outwards.

By its very nature pleasure is limited and transitory.

It is beautiful by its very nature.

Your book knowledge is useful to begin with, but soon it must be given up for direct experience, which by its very nature is inexpressible.

This speck, by its very nature, radiates and creates pictures in space and events in time -- effortlessly and spontaneously.

Q: By its very nature the mind is restless.

By its very nature the mind is outward turned; it always tends to seek for the source of things among the things themselves; to be told to look for the source within, is, in a way, the beginning of a new life.

The personal self by its very nature is constantly pursuing pleasure and avoiding pain.

By its very nature it comes and goes.

Q: Is not life by its very nature repetitive?

By its very nature it is painful and transient.

The mind misunderstands, misunderstanding is its very nature.

The jnani does not need your prayers.

M: The jnani does not die because he was never born.

101: Jnani does not Grasp, nor Hold.

M: I know nothing about it all and see no difference between you and me.

M: I know nothing about miracles, and I wonder whether nature admits exceptions to her laws, unless we agree that everything is a miracle.

M: The scriptures say so, but I know nothing about it.

Q: I know nothing about being the cause of the universe.

I know nothing about it.

By knowing what you are not, you come to know your self.

If you know God as you know your self, you need not say it.

You say you want to know your self.

M: How do you know, that you do not know your self?

You imagine you do not know your self, because you cannot describe your self.

You can only know your self by being yourself without any attempt at self-definition and self-description.

Know yourself as the ocean of being, the womb of all existence.

Abandon all imaginings and know yourself as you are.

Calm and clarify your mind and you will know yourself as you are.

Know yourself as the total.

When you know yourself as a centre of consciousness, the world appears as the ocean of the mind.

When you know yourself as you are in reality, you know the world as yourself.

Know yourself as you are -- a mere point in consciousness, dimensionless and timeless.

Only when you know yourself as entirely alien to and different from the body, will you find respite from the mixture of fear and craving inseparable from the 'I-am-the-body' idea.

But when you know yourself as beyond space and time -- in contact with them only at the point of here and now, otherwise all-pervading and all-containing, unapproachable, unassailable, invulnerable -- you will be afraid no longer.

Know yourself as you are -- against fear there is no other remedy.

Know yourself as independent and you will be free from fear and its shadows.

As long as you have all sorts of ideas about yourself, you know yourself through the mist of these ideas; to know yourself as you are, give up all ideas.

Once you know yourself as pure being, the ecstasy of freedom is your own.

M: On the level of consciousness -- yes.

It is the very essence of Yoga -- ever raising the level of consciousness, discovery of new dimensions, with their properties, qualities and powers.

You cannot fight pain and pleasure on the level of consciousness.

It does not denote a level of consciousness.

It does not denote a level of consciousness.

From the mind's point of view, it is but an opening for the light of awareness to enter the mental space.

Remove the light of awareness, go to sleep or swoon away -- and the person disappears.

If you think it out carefully and brood over it for a long time, you will come to see the light of awareness in all its clarity and the world will fade out of your vision.

M: What is seen may undergo many changes when the light of awareness is focussed on it, but it is the object that changes, not the light.

When you do not take yourself to be the body, then the family life of the body, however intense and interesting, is seen only as a play on the screen of the mind, with the light of awareness as the only reality.

When you understand that names and shapes are hollow shells without any content whatsoever, and what is real is nameless and formless, pure energy of life and light of consciousness, you will be at peace -- immersed in the deep silence of reality.

Both can exist only in the light of consciousness, which again, arises in the wake of the sense 'I am'.

But ultimately there is no inner, nor outer; the light of consciousness is both the creator and the creature, the experiencer and the experience, the body and the embodied.

In the light of consciousness all sorts of things happen and one need not give special importance to any.

In that pure light of consciousness there is nothing, not even the idea of nothing.

M: The light of consciousness passes through the film of memory and throws pictures on your brain.

Just live your life as it comes, but alertly, watchfully, allowing everything to happen as it happens, doing the natural things the natural way, suffering, rejoicing -- as life brings.

You want me to live your life, feel your way, use your language.

Live your life without hurting anybody.

M: Live your life intelligently, with the interests of your deepest self always in mind.

You step, so to say, aside and let your Guru live your life.

The inclusive mind is love in action, battling against circumstances, initially frustrated, ultimately victorious.

There is only love in action.

Give up the bondage of self-concern and be what you are -- intelligence and love in action.

He is the same dimensionless centre of perception and love in action.

Awareness is love in action.

Once you have understood that the world is love in action, you will look at it quite differently.

Sadhana is only a vessel and it must be filled to the brim with earnestness, which is but love in action.

Begin as a centre of observation, deliberate cognisance, and grow into a centre of love in action.

Maharaj: I met my Guru when I was 34 and realised by 37.

M: Until I met my Guru I knew so many things.

Take my example; there was nothing in me of much promise, but when I met my Guru, I listened, trusted and obeyed.

When I met my Guru, he told me: 'You are not what you take yourself to be.

Now I have met my Guru and I am at peace, after having surrendered myself to him completely.

Your ideas about yourself change from day to day and from moment to moment.

Your balance must be dynamic, based on doing just the right thing, from moment to moment.

From moment to moment, the little I need to know to live my life, I somehow happen to know.

To strengthen, and stabilise the 'I am' we do all sorts of things -- all in vain, for the 'I am' is being rebuilt from moment to moment.

On the other hand, consciousness is changeful, flowing, undergoing transformation from moment to moment.

From moment to moment you are renewing it.

M: Between the remembered and the actual there is a basic difference which can be observed from moment to moment.

For peace you must go beyond the world.

You must conquer your own mind and for this you must go beyond it.

You need not gather any more, rather you must go beyond experience.

But if you want positive knowledge, you must go beyond the mind.

To know what you are, you must go beyond the mind.

To go beyond them you must go beyond consciousness, which is possible only when you look at consciousness as something that happens to you and not in you, as something external, alien, superimposed.

M: To understand suffering, you must go beyond pain and pleasure.

Definitions and descriptions have their place as useful incentives for further search, but you must go beyond them into what is undefinable and indescribable, except in negative terms.

To know it directly you must go beyond the mind addicted to causality and the tyranny of time.

To be what you are, you must go beyond the mind, into your own being.

Q: I am what I know myself to be.

Sometimes I feel myself to be neither mind nor body, but one single all-seeing eye.

When I go deeper into it, I find myself to be all I see and the world and myself become one.

Q: If what I am, as I am, the person I take myself to be, cannot be happy, then what am I to do?

I just blink, for I know myself to be a tiny little bundle of desires and fears, a bubble of suffering, a transient flash of consciousness in an ocean of darkness.

Q: Whatever I may be in reality, yet I feel myself to be a small and separate person, one amongst many.

I do not feel myself to be in control of such states.

Q: If I become anything I think myself to be, and I start thinking that I am the Supreme Reality, will not my Supreme Reality remain a mere idea?

Were I to think myself to be a body known by its name, I would not have been able to answer your questions.

I just cannot think myself to be permanently in a state of dream.

I occupy little space and last but a few moments; I cannot even conceive myself to be eternal and all-pervading.

Q: I can imagine myself to be beyond.

Sometimes I feel myself to be a mere centre of awareness.

What I take myself to be, becomes my body and all that happens to that body becomes my mind.

Q: What difference will it make in action what I take myself to be.

Even my so-called free choice is predetermined; only I am not aware of it and imagine myself to be free.

He does not know that to grow is in the nature of consciousness.

It is in the nature of consciousness to survive its vehicles.

M: Creation is in the very nature of consciousness.

The world seen in consciousness is to be of the nature of consciousness, when there is harmony (sattva); but when activity and passivity (rajas and tamas) appear, they obscure and distort and you see the false as real.

He does not know that to grow is in the nature of consciousness.

It is in the nature of consciousness to survive its vehicles.

M: Creation is in the very nature of consciousness.

The world seen in consciousness is to be of the nature of consciousness, when there is harmony (sattva); but when activity and passivity (rajas and tamas) appear, they obscure and distort and you see the false as real.

For as long as knowledge means description in terms of what is already known, perceptual, or conceptual, there can be no such thing as self-knowledge, for what you are cannot be described, except as except as total negation.

As to my mind, there is no such thing.

Q: Is there no such thing as immortality?

I come back again and again to this question of sin and virtue, because now- a-days young people keep on saying that there is no such thing as sin, that one need not be squermish and should follow the moment's desire readily.

If the frog in the hole were told about the outside world, he would say: 'There is no such thing.

M: There is no such thing as not-knowing.

M: Beyond the mind there is no such thing as experience.

There is no such thing as compromise in Yoga.

And the moment you step out, you realise that there is no such thing and never was.

There will be no end to it, because there is no such thing as peace of mind.

There is no such thing as an expression of reality.

M: There is no such thing as a person.

There is no such thing as a separate person.

See that there is no such thing as a permanently separate person and all becomes clear.

M: You are neither the body nor in the body -- there is no such thing as body.

The idea that I am not the body gives reality to the body, when in fact, there is no such thing as body, it is but a state of mind.

There is no such thing.

There is no such thing as unconsciousness, for unconsciousness is not experienceable.

Q: Is there no such thing as permanent perfection?

Q: Is there no such thing as the Guru's grace?

In reality, there is no such thing.

Q: The other day you told us that there is no such thing as karma.

After all, there is no such thing as mind apart from thoughts which come and go obeying their own laws, not yours.

Q: Is there no such thing as free will?

Q: Is there no such thing as self-preparation?

There is no such thing.

Q: If there is no such thing as the knowledge of the real, then how do I reach it?

M: There is no such thing as the experience of the real.

You are concerned with your own happiness and I am telling you that there is no such thing.

In my view there is no such thing as beginning or end -- these are all related to time.

There can be no such thing as changeless consciousness.

M: There is no such thing as mind.

There is no such thing as overcoming the pain and no training is needed.

I mean the totality of being, the ocean of consciousness, the entire universe of all that is and knows.

Our minds are just waves on the ocean of consciousness.

I am that infinite ocean of consciousness in which all happens.

M: realise yourself as the ocean of consciousness in which all happens.

Once you realise that bodily existence is but a state of mind, a movement in consciousness, that the ocean of consciousness is infinite and eternal, and that, when in touch with consciousness, you are the witness only, you will be able to withdraw beyond consciousness altogether.

Look closely, and you will see that all names and forms are but transitory waves on the ocean of consciousness, that only consciousness can be said to be, not its transformations.

Questioner: It is a matter of daily experience that on waking up the world suddenly appears.

And on waking up, was it not the sense 'I am' that came first?

On waking up the experience runs: 'I am -- the body -- in the world.

Q: On waking up I come to know.

On waking up he asked his Guru -- Vasishta: Am I a king dreaming of being a beggar, or a beggar dreaming of being a king?

M: Just as you recreate your world on waking up, so is the universe unrolled.

Do they disappear on waking up?

On waking up you find you are love itself, embracing all.

Once you realise that the person is merely a shadow of the reality, but not reality itself, you cease to fret and worry.

Once you realise that whatever appears before you cannot be yourself, and cannot say 'I am', you are free of all your 'persons' and their demands.

Once you realise that the world is your own projection, you are free of it.

As long as you give first place to the world, you are bound by it; once you realise, beyond all trace of doubt that the world is in you and not you in the world, you are out of it.

Once you realise your own unassailable being, you will be at peace.

Once you realise that all comes from within, that the world in which you live has not been projected onto you but by you, your fear comes to an end.

Once you realise that bodily existence is but a state of mind, a movement in consciousness, that the ocean of consciousness is infinite and eternal, and that, when in touch with consciousness, you are the witness only, you will be able to withdraw beyond consciousness altogether.

Once you realise that the road is the goal and that you are always on the road, not to reach a goal, but to enjoy its beauty and its wisdom, life ceases to be a task and becomes natural and simple, in itself an ecstasy.

Once you realise that the body depends on the mind, and the mind on consciousness, and consciousness on awareness and not the other way round, your question about waiting for self- realisation till you die is answered.

Once you realise that all happens by itself, (call it destiny, or the will of God or mere accident), you remain as witness only, understanding and enjoying, but not perturbed.

Once you realise that there is nothing in this world, which you can call your own, you look at it from the outside as you look at a play on the stage, or a picture on the screen, admiring and enjoying, but really unmoved.

Q: I seek peace of mind.

Q: It gave me peace of mind.

There will be no end to it, because there is no such thing as peace of mind.

For many years you sought your peace of mind.

Can you claim a peace of mind that is unassailable?

M: For this you need a well-ordered and quiet life, peace of mind and immense earnestness.

Maharaj: Causation means succession in time of events in space, the space being physical or mental.

M: Every pleasure, physical or mental, needs an instrument.

But when some physical or mental trouble comes, my mind goes dull and grey, or seeks frantically for relief.

But your attention is fixed on things, physical or mental.

Q: Desire and fear both are feelings caused by physical or mental factors.

M: The happiness you can think of and long for, is mere physical or mental satisfaction.

Nothing, physical or mental, can give you freedom.

I am what I am, not identifiable with any physical or mental state.

It may seem obscured by clouds and dust, but only from the point of view of the perceiver.

Even if it is, it is only so from the mind's point of view, but In fact the entire universe (mahadakash) exists only in consciousness (chidakash), while I have my stand in the Absolute (paramakash).

From the mind's point of view, it is but an opening for the light of awareness to enter the mental space.

Maharaj: From the highest point of view the world has no cause.

You say they are uncaused -- from your point of view.

Q: From the relative point of view, everything must have a cause.

You are able to look from the absolute point of view -- why go back to the relative?

Q: From what point of view you deny causation?

Has it any value from the spiritual point of view?

M: From the self's point of view the world is the known, the Supreme -- the Unknown.

M: Again the personal point of view!

From our point of view the world is a dale of tears, a place to escape from, as soon as possible and by every possible means.

M: From my point of view everything happens by itself, quite spontaneously.

M: Again you assume that your point of view is the only correct one.

From the animal's point of view being killed is not the worst form of dying; surely preferable to sickness and senile decay.

Q: From the Westerner's point of view there is something disturbing in your ways.

Even taking the empirical point of view, it is obvious that everything is the cause of everything, that everything is as it is, because the entire universe is as it is.

M: You are right -- from the body's point of view.

Q: From which point of view are they identical?

But this is true only from the relative point of view.

M: Maybe something prevents you from knowing?

What prevents you from knowing is not the lack of opportunity, but the lack of ability to focus in your mind what you want to understand.

M: Nothing stops you but preoccupation with the outer which prevents you from focussing the inner.

The very seeking prevents you from finding.

Something prevents you from seeing that there is nothing you need.

Find out what prevents you from taking.

What prevents you from knowing yourself as all and beyond all, is the mind based on memory.

Questioner: My question is: What is the proof of truth?

Followers of every religion, metaphysical or political, philosophical or ethical, are convinced that theirs is the only truth, that all else is false and they take their own unshakable conviction for the proof of truth.

I cannot accept samadhi, however glorious, as a proof of truth.

But don't you see, you are asking for the proof of truth, without explaining what is the truth you have in mind and what proof will satisfy you?

M: You refuse testimony as the proof of truth: the experience of others is of no use to you, you reject all inference from the concurring statements of a vast number of independent witnesses; so it is for you to tell me what is the proof that will satisfy you, what is your test of a valid proof?

You seem to want the proof of truth to precede truth.

I and asking about the proof of truth and am being given the methods of attaining it.

Your question about the proof of truth is born from ignorance of reality.

You ask for the proof of truth while to me all existence is the proof.

Instead of searching for the proof of truth, which you do not know, go through the proofs you have of what you believe to know.

You are back at your initial question: What is the proof of truth?

The same with the 'proof of truth'.

You imagine that permanence is the proof of truth, that what lasts longer is somehow more true.

And since time is in the mind, the mind becomes the arbiter and searches within itself for the proof of truth -- a task altogether impossible and hopeless!

Q: Can we say that action is the proof of truth?

Once you realise that all comes from within, that the world in which you live has not been projected onto you but by you, your fear comes to an end.

realise that all happens in consciousness and you are the root, the source, the foundation of consciousness.

Once you realise that all happens by itself, (call it destiny, or the will of God or mere accident), you remain as witness only, understanding and enjoying, but not perturbed.

When you realise that all is in your mind and that you are beyond the mind, that you are truly alone; then all is you.

Learn to distinguish the immovable in the movable, the unchanging in the changing, till you realise that all differences are in appearance only and oneness is a fact.

And the moment you step out, you realise that there is no such thing and never was.

Or realise that there is no desire outside the mind and stay out.

realise that there is nobody to force it on you, that it is due to the habit of taking the imaginary to be real.

By all means become aware -- this will bring you to the self and you will realise that there is neither ignorance nor delusion in it.

Once you realise that there is nothing in this world, which you can call your own, you look at it from the outside as you look at a play on the stage, or a picture on the screen, admiring and enjoying, but really unmoved.

First realise that your world is only a reflection of yourself and stop finding fault with the reflection.

When you realise that your mind too is a part of nature, the duality will cease.

Examine the idea, see its inherent contradictions, realise that your present existence is like a shower of sparks, each spark lasting a second and the shower itself -- a minute or two.

M: You do not realise that your present waking state is one of ignorance.

realise that your true nature is that of pure light only, and both the perceived and the perceiver come and go together.

Look at yourself fearlessly and you will at once realise that your happiness depends on conditions and circumstances, hence it is momentary, not real.

First realise that your problem exists in your waking state only, that however painful it is, you are able to forget it altogether when you go to sleep.

M: Contemplate life as infinite, undivided, ever present, ever active, until you realise yourself as one with it.

M: realise yourself as the ocean of consciousness in which all happens.

You must realise yourself as the immovable, behind and beyond the movable, the silent witness of all that happens.

realise yourself as away from all that can be pointed at as 'this' or 'that'.

realise yourself as the source and not as the river; that is all.

When you realise yourself as less than a point in space and time, something too small to be cut and too short-lived to be killed, then, and then only, all fear goes.

Reality is beyond both.

Reality is beyond the subjective and objective, beyond all levels, beyond every distinction.

They say reality is beyond the mind while all discussions are within the realm of the mind, which is the home of the unreal.

These are all metaphors of course; the reality is beyond description.

But the fundamental reality is beyond awareness, beyond the three states of becoming, being and not-being.

Reality is beyond consciousness.

But the Absolute Reality is beyond both.

Q: You said that reality is beyond the knowledge and the teaching of the real.

All knowledge is in memory; it is only recognition, while reality is beyond the duality of the knower and the known.

As long as you feel competent and confident, reality is beyond your reach.

Both the Yogi and the Bhogi, after all, are concerned with the search for happiness.

Don't you see that it is your very search for happiness that makes you feel miserable?

66: All Search for Happiness is Misery.

All search for happiness is misery and leads to more misery.

Do not try to make yourself happy, rather question your very search for happiness.

On the other hand, the very search for pleasure is the cause of pain.

M: What else can be the cause of this universal search for pleasure?

With all sense of limitation gone, fear, pain and the search for pleasure -- all cease.

This reflex takes the shape of 'I' and uses the body and the mind for its purposes, which are invariably in search for pleasure or flight from pain.

Your constant flight from pain and search for pleasure is a sign of love you bear for your self, all I plead with you is this: make love of your self perfect.

It is the search for pleasure that is wrong.

But the very longing and search for reality is the movement, operation, action of reality.

The search for reality is itself the movement of reality.

One has to understand that the search for reality, or God, or Guru and the search for the self are the same; when one is found, all are found.

The search for reality is the most dangerous of all undertakings for it will destroy the world in which you live.

Devotion to you goal makes you live a clean and orderly life, given to search for truth and to helping people, and realisation makes noble virtue easy and spontaneous, by removing for good the obstacles in the shape of desires and fears and wrong ideas.

It is useless to search for truth, when the mind is blind to the false.

Discard every self-seeking motive as soon as it is seen and you need not search for truth; truth will find you.

M: It is by The Guru's grace that your mind is engaged in search for truth and it is by his grace that you will find it.

Q: I can see the beauty and feel the blessedness of a life devoted to search for truth under a competent and loving teacher.

To find reality you must be real in the smallest daily action; there can be no deceit in the search for truth.

The sense of being, of 'I am' is the first to emerge.

Q: The sense of being an experiencer, the sense of 'I am', is it not also an experience?

Both are based on the sense of being.

Q: I can now understand that I am not the person, but that which, when reflected in the person, gives it a sense of being.

M: By focussing the mind on 'I am', on the sense of being, 'I am so-and-so' dissolves; "I am a witness only" remains and that too submerges in 'I am all'.

Q: Is the sense of being a product of experience only?

'I am' as the sense of being remains.

In witnessing, in awareness, self-consciousness, the sense of being this or that, is not.

Even the sense of 'I am' is composed of the pure light and the sense of being.

As a matter of fact, before you can experience anything, there must be the sense of being.

It is useless to fight the sense of being a limited and separate person unless the roots of it are laid bare.

Q: The sense of being is there all the time -- no doubt.

The pure sense of being is usually crowded out.

Go to the root of all experience, to the sense of being.

He has no sense of being a separate person.

Q: I have abandoned it intellectually, but the sense of being the particular, a person, is still with me.

My sense of being proves only that I am; it does not prove anything which is independent of me.

It is what remains when all self- identification is given up as false -- pure consciousness, the sense of being all there is, or could be.

In reality there is only one state; when distorted by self-identification it is called a person, when coloured with the sense of being, it is the witness; when colourless and limitless, it is called the Supreme.

Q: The sense of being and the sense of living -- are they one and the same, or different?

Abandon every attempt, just be; don't strive, don't struggle, let go every support, hold on to the blind sense of being, brushing off all else.

Obviously, it is your sense of being present.

In terms of time, space and causation it is all-powerful, being the causeless cause; all-pervading, eternal, in the sense of being beginningless, endless and ever-present.

In reality each experience has its own experiencer and the sense of identity is due to the common factor at the root of all experiencer- experience relations.

It does not explain the strong sense of identity pervading consciousness, the sense 'I am'.

The sense of identity pervades the universal.

What is this sense of identity due to, if not to something beyond consciousness?

The sense of identity will remain, but no longer identification with a particular body.

Of course, there is a sense of identity, but it is the identity of a memory track, like the identity of a sequence of pictures on the ever-present screen.

The final stage of meditation is reached when the sense of identity goes beyond the 'I-am-so-and-so', beyond 'so-l-am', beyond 'I-am-the-witness-only', beyond 'there-is', beyond all ideas into the impersonally personal pure being.

Maharaj: As long as there is the body and the sense of identity with the body, frustration is inevitable.

M: Yes, your father-mother, the source from which you came.

There must be a source from which all this flows, a foundation on which all stands.

It is the power behind the witness, the source from which all flows.

Not being continuous, the sense of 'I' must have a source from which it flows and to which it returns.

But the source of all that is, is the Infinite Possibility, the Supreme Reality, which is in you and which throws its power and light and love on every experience.

M: The source of all has all.

I talk only of the timeless source of all the gods with all their universes, past, present and future.

The self is the source of all, and of all -- the final destination.

You are telling me such wonderful things about myself; according to you I am eternal, omnipresent, omniscient, supremely happy, creator, preserver and destroyer of all there is, the source of all life, the heart of being, the lord and the beloved of every creature.

All arise, all merge in the same ocean, the source of all is one.

He alone who was before the Creator, your own real being, the source of all the worlds with their creators.

I know the source of all experience.

The ending of the self with its desires and fears enables you to return to your real nature, the source of all happiness and peace.

Selfishness is the source of all evil.

And you are the perceiving point, the non-dimensional source of all dimensions.

It is the primary, the unborn, the ancient source of all that is.

What is perfect, returns to the source of all perfection and the opposites play on.

Q: You told us the other day that we cannot even dream of perfection before realisation, for the Self is the source of all perfection and not the mind.

Q: What is the source of consciousness?

M: The source of consciousness cannot be an object in consciousness.

Neither material nor mental, neither objective nor subjective, it is the root of matter and the source of consciousness.

68: Seek the Source of Consciousness.

M: Be aware of being conscious and seek the source of consciousness.

Beyond space and time I am, uncaused, uncausing, yet the very matrix of existence.

Even space and time are imagined.

Beyond space and time is the here and the now of reality.

Go beyond the 'I-am-the-body' idea and you will find that space and time are in you and not you in space and time.

When the self-identification with the body is no more, all space and time are in your mind, which is a mere ripple in consciousness, which is awareness reflected in nature.

Space and time are the body and the mind of the universal existence.

My feeling is that all that happens in space and time happens to me, that every experience is my experience every form is my form.

But when you know yourself as beyond space and time -- in contact with them only at the point of here and now, otherwise all-pervading and all-containing, unapproachable, unassailable, invulnerable -- you will be afraid no longer.

M: All space and time are in the mind.

It means that you are independent of space and time, that space and time are in you, not you in them.

Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj.

That there should be yet another addition of I AM THAT is not surprising, for the sublimity of the words spoken by Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, their directness and the lucidity with which they refer to the Highest have already made this book a literature of paramount importance.

It was in such a state of scepticism, but also having an intuition of the basic reality, that I happened to read Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj's I AM THAT.

Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj is indeed such a Guru.

I am thankful to Sudhakar S. Dikshit, the editor, for inviting me to write the Foreword to this new edition of I AM THAT and thus giving me an opportunity to pay my homage to Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, who has expounded highest knowledge in the simplest, clearest and the most convincing words.

Writing a biographical note on Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj is a frustrating and unrewarding task.

After his illuminating experience Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj started living such a dual life.

I met Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj some years back and was impressed with the spontaneous simplicity of his appearance and behaviour and his deep and genuine earnestness in expounding his experience.

A Marathi version of these talks, verified by Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj himself, has been separately published.

Not only the matter has now been re-set in a more readable typeface and with chapter headings, but new pictures of Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj have been included and the appendices contain some hitherto unpublished valuable material.

In fact Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj is peculiarly free from all disparagement and condemnation; the sinner and the saint are merely exchanging notes; the saint has sinned, the sinner can be sanctified.

By precept and example Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj shows a short-cut, a-logical but empirically sound.

Even Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi imposed on himself 20 years of silence before he began to teach.

Q: Sri Ramana Maharshi's teachings have put me on my way.

Q: Sri Ramana Maharshi died.

Can I ask you what is your opinion of Sri Ramana Maharshi?

Q: Yes, Sri Ramana Maharshi used to say: Gurus there are many, but where are the disciples?

To me they are states of mind only, and I am not the mind.

To remember, to forget -- these are all states of mind, thoughtbound, word-bound.

Movement and rest are states of mind and cannot be without their opposites.

M: Pleasure and pain are states of mind.

Non-investigation is the thread on which all the states of mind are strung.

All states of mind, all names and forms of existence are rooted in non-enquiry, non-investigation, in imagination and credulity.

Both are states of mind.

What puzzles me is that we derive pleasure from things and states of mind, which have nothing to do with survival.

All kinds of states of mind are presented to awareness and there is self-identification with them.

They are only states of mind, which again is but an appearance of movement in consciousness which is in its essence immutable.

Q: I can distinguish two states of mind: 'I am' and 'the world is'; they arise and subside together.

M: He who knows the mind as non-realised and realised, who knows ignorance and knowledge as states of mind, he is the real.

For as long as knowledge means description in terms of what is already known, perceptual, or conceptual, there can be no such thing as self-knowledge, for what you are cannot be described, except as except as total negation.

Q: Is there no such thing as immortality?

I come back again and again to this question of sin and virtue, because now- a-days young people keep on saying that there is no such thing as sin, that one need not be squermish and should follow the moment's desire readily.

M: There is no such thing as not-knowing.

M: Beyond the mind there is no such thing as experience.

There is no such thing as compromise in Yoga.

There will be no end to it, because there is no such thing as peace of mind.

There is no such thing as an expression of reality.

M: There is no such thing as a person.

There is no such thing as a separate person.

See that there is no such thing as a permanently separate person and all becomes clear.

M: You are neither the body nor in the body -- there is no such thing as body.

The idea that I am not the body gives reality to the body, when in fact, there is no such thing as body, it is but a state of mind.

There is no such thing as unconsciousness, for unconsciousness is not experienceable.

Q: Is there no such thing as permanent perfection?

Q: Is there no such thing as the Guru's grace?

Q: The other day you told us that there is no such thing as karma.

After all, there is no such thing as mind apart from thoughts which come and go obeying their own laws, not yours.

Q: Is there no such thing as free will?

Q: Is there no such thing as self-preparation?

Q: If there is no such thing as the knowledge of the real, then how do I reach it?

M: There is no such thing as the experience of the real.

In my view there is no such thing as beginning or end -- these are all related to time.

There can be no such thing as changeless consciousness.

M: There is no such thing as mind.

There is no such thing as overcoming the pain and no training is needed.

20: The Supreme is Beyond All.

But the Supreme is beyond all, yet because of its infinite permeability all cogent desires can be fulfilled.

Life creates everything but the Supreme is beyond all.

But the Supreme is beyond all distinctions and to it the term 'real' does not apply, for in it all is real and, therefore, need not be labelled as such.

'I am', is enough to heal your mind and take you beyond.

But it will not take you beyond the idea of a table.

Whatever effort you make, whatever method (sadhana) you follow, will merely generate more experience, but will not take you beyond.

It is the blank refusal to consider the convolutions and convulsions of the mind that can take you beyond it.

Words alone cannot take you beyond the mind.

Collecting right ideas also will take you nowhere.

You are not the body and dragging the body from place to place will take you nowhere.

Self-depreciation will take you nowhere.

Unless you find it yourself it will not be your own way and will take you nowhere.

M: Unless you make tremendous efforts, you will not be convinced that effort will take you nowhere.

Q: What benefit is there in knowing that I am not the body?

The only difference between us is that I am aware of my natural state, while you are bemused.

Q: But you already told me that I am the Supreme Reality.

Q: Well, you told me that I am the Supreme Reality.

M: I remain aware that I am unconscious.

I may be quite certain that I am beyond time and space, and yet unable to locate myself at will at some point of time and space.

Q: The worry with me is that I am prone to denying existence to what I cannot imagine.

Q: Yes, I see that I am the witness, the awareness itself.

He told me that I am beyond all perceivables and conceivables -- I believed.

Q: I would call it rather unconscious existence; I am, but I do not know that I am.

M: You have said just now: 'I am, but I do not know that I am'.

Q: I can now understand that I am not the person, but that which, when reflected in the person, gives it a sense of being.

Q: By what sign shall l know that I am beyond sin and virtue?

Q: Can I say that I am not what I am conscious of, nor am I consciousness itself?

All I know is that I am the world is, the world troubles me and I trouble the world.

I found that I am conscious and happy absolutely and only by mistake I thought I owed beingconsciousness- bliss to the body and the world of bodies.

I have not forgotten that I am.

You cannot prove to me that I am not.

Even when convinced that I am not -- I am.

That I am is obvious.

That I am happy is not at all obvious.

Q: I know that I am not the body.

Q: I find that I am totally motivated by desire for pleasure and fear of pain.

Q: And when I realise that I am not the body, shall I be free from desire and fear?

To tell me that I am not honest does not help me, for I just do not know how to make myself honest.

M: It is not of myself that I am sure, I am sure of you.

Q: The fact is that I am thinking of myself as the body.

Q: From early childhood I was taught to think that I am limited to my name and shape.

And I know that I am so and so, the owner of the body, in manifold relations with other owners.

If I am blind from birth and you tell me that you know things without touching them, while I must touch to know, I am aware that I am blind without knowing what does it mean to see.

Similarly, I know that I am lacking something when you assert things which I cannot grasp.

Q: It is not for the training that I am asking just now, but for its results.

You want me to prove to you that I am trustworthy!

Whatever the question, you invariably turn it upon itself and bring me to the basic fact that I am living in an illusion of my own making and that reality is inexpressible in words.

What matters is that I am neither the body nor the mind.

Q: I cannot say that I am now a different man.

Q: If I become anything I think myself to be, and I start thinking that I am the Supreme Reality, will not my Supreme Reality remain a mere idea?

This desire is so strong that I am constantly afraid.

And yet I feel that I am an infant.

Go back to that state of pure being, where the 'I am' is still in its purity before it got contaminated with 'this I am' or 'that I am'.

Q: The truth is that I am a mind imprisoned in a body and this is a very unhappy truth.

Q: All right, I shall not insist that I am the body.

The idea that I am not the body gives reality to the body, when in fact, there is no such thing as body, it is but a state of mind.

If I stop reacting, you will say that I am unconscious.

Do not tell me that I am not asking the right question, or that you do not know the answer, or that in your world my question is meaningless; the moment you start talking about your world and my world as different and incompatible, you build a wall between us.

Q: Do you mean to say that you spend your time repeating 'this I am not, that I am not'?

By the grace of my Guru I have realised once and for good that I am neither object nor subject and I do not need to remind myself all the time.

Since at any point of time and space I can be both the subject and the object of experience, I express it by saying that I am both, and neither, and beyond both.

It is clear to me that I am telling you the truth.

Only you must trust me that I mean what I say, that I am quite serious.

Having realised that I am one with, and yet beyond the world, I became free from all desire and fear.

Q: It is the life-story of thus body-mind that I am interested in.

Q: Must not I think with some conviction that I am not the body?

Q: If my true being is always with me, how is it that I am ignorant of it?

I know only that I am, and that much you also know.

Q: Of course I know that I am.

I cannot say that I am in God or I am God; God is the universal light and love, the universal witness: I am beyond the universal even.

This I try to express my saying that I am beyond the mind.

Similarly, I know that I am all.

My sense of being proves only that I am; it does not prove anything which is independent of me.

Does it mean that I am not eligible for truth?

Q: You keep on saying that I am the creator, preserver and destroyer of this world, omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent.

M: I do not have the feeling that I am talking.

He only told me that I am the Supreme and then died.

Q: Will the understanding that I am not the body give me the strength of character needed for self- control?

Q: I find that I am always restless, longing, hoping, seeking, finding, enjoying, abandoning, searching again.

Q: I feel that I am.

Q: All that I understand is that I am in the grip of a beginningless illusion.

Q: How shall I know that I am moving in the right direction?

Q: What of it that I am out of conflict?

While awake, I know that I am, but am not happy; in sleep I am, I am happy, but I don't know it.

All I need is to know that I am free and happy.

Q: I can see that I am false.

The sentence: ' I can see that I am false' contains all you need for liberation.

Q: I feel my hold on the body is so strong that I just cannot give up the idea that I am the body.

Q: Please don't tell me that I am dreaming and that I will soon wake up.

Q: You keep on telling me that I am dreaming and that it is high time I should wake up.

You can always say: 'I know that I am' and you will refuse as untrue the statement: 'I am not'.

Q: Well, I admit that I am, I was, I shall be; at least from birth to death.

M: There is no difference between us; nor can I say that I know myself, I know that I am not describable nor definable.

Q: What strikes me as exceedingly strange is that while you say that I am merely a product of my memories and woefully limited, I create a vast and rich world in which.

There is nothing which is different from me.

Questioner: As I can see, there is nothing wrong with my body nor with my real being.

M: There is nothing peculiar in the present event to make it different from the past and future.

There is nothing in the present event itself that makes it stand out as real.

M: You discover that there is nothing to discover.

There is nothing to recognise it by.

Without the 'I am' there is nothing.

M: Outside the Self there is nothing.

M: All these ideas and distinctions exist in your world; in mine there is nothing of the kind.

M: There is nothing I need doing.

In realisation there is nothing to hold on to and nothing to forget.

There is nothing contemptible about the so- called 'common' people and their 'common' lives.

M: There is nothing wrong with duality as long as it does not create conflict.

There is nothing wrong with memory as such.

There is nothing more to it.

There is nothing mysterious about it.

I do not see the world as separate from me and so there is nothing for me to desire, or fear.

There is nothing real about them.

There is nothing unnatural about it.

M: There is nothing wrong in the idea of a body, nor even in the idea 'I am the body'.

There is nothing fanciful about it.

There is nothing to be afraid of.

Nothing was divided and there is nothing to unite.

There is nothing cruel in what I say.

There is nothing to be done, nothing to be given up.

There is nothing that cannot be achieved by training.

There is nothing wrong in trying to help the world.

It is a new dimension altogether, where there is nothing to give or take.

There is nothing wrong in repeating the same truth again and again until it becomes reality.

The state of witnessing is full of power, there is nothing passive about it.

Only reality is, there is nothing else.

The treatment is routine, with hardly any change, but there is nothing monotonous about health.

The beingness in being, the awareness in consciousness, the interest in every experience -- that is not describable, yet perfectly accessible, for there is nothing else.

There is nothing else.

Q: Since there is nothing basically wrong in desire as an expression of love of self, how should desire be managed?

There is nothing personal about the self.

There is nothing I feel separate from, hence I am all.

There is nothing personal about me, though the language and the style may appear personal.

There is nothing I desire or fear -- how can there be a pattern?

There is nothing else to give up.

There is nothing stronger.

M: There is nothing to gain.

M: There is nothing to practise.

In fact there is nothing to remember.

There is nothing wrong with the senses, it is your imagination that misleads you.

To myself I am neither perceivable nor conceivable; there is nothing I can point out and say: 'this I am'.

There is nothing wrong with the world.

There is nothing wrong with your world, it is your thinking yourself to be separate from it that creates disorder.

M: I am conscious and unconscious, both conscious and unconscious, neither conscious nor unconscious -- to all this I am witness -- but really there is no witness, because there is nothing to be a witness to.

There is nothing wrong with you as the Self.

M: There is nothing to do.

There is nothing gradual about it.

The teacher tells the watcher: you are not this, there is nothing of yours in this, except the little point of 'I am', which is the bridge between the watcher and his dream.

One thing I have understood: there is nothing to search for.

M: There is nothing to renounce.

Something prevents you from seeing that there is nothing you need.

See that there is nothing to be afraid of.

M: Fearlessness comes by itself, when you see that there is nothing to be afraid of.

But the real giving up is in realising that there is nothing to give up, for nothing is your own.

There is nothing I can build on my momentary existence as a person.

You are the way and the goal, there is nothing else to reach except yourself.

M: There is nothing in the world that you cannot know, when you know yourself.

There is nothing permanent about me.

There is nothing that can help the world more than your putting an end to ignorance.

There is nothing wrong in it.

In that pure light of consciousness there is nothing, not even the idea of nothing.

It is like a man saying: 'I have done my work, there is nothing left to do'.

M: There is nothing I want to know.

Q: I know only my conditioned existence; there is nothing else.

M: There is nothing in my mind.

There is nothing new you will find here.

There is nothing to be said about it.

Examine them as they occur, give them your full attention and you will find that there is nothing like ignorance, only inattention.

Once you realise that there is nothing in this world, which you can call your own, you look at it from the outside as you look at a play on the stage, or a picture on the screen, admiring and enjoying, but really unmoved.

It is best expressed negatively as: 'there is nothing wrong with me.

Q: There is nothing wrong with my convictions; my actions are shaped by circumstances.

The realised man lives on the level of the absolutes; his wisdom, love and courage are complete, there is nothing relative about him.

There is nothing wrong with suffering for the sins of others.

There is nothing we can do, we can only let things happen according to their nature.

There is nothing I can give, or deny, which you do not have already in equal measure.

There is nothing to seek and find, for there is nothing lost.

M: There is only light and the light is all.

In reality there is only consciousness.

Q: When I paint, there is only the painting and myself.

There is only one Self, the Supreme Reality, in which the personal and the impersonal are one.

There is only forgetting.

Of all the innumerable steps there is only the last which brings you to your destination.

There is only reality, in which no 'thing' has any being on its own.

There is only a stream of sensations, perceptions, memories and ideations.

Beyond the body there is only the One.

But for a seeker for reality there is only one meditation -- the rigorous refusal to harbour thoughts.

There is only one mistake you are making: you take the inner for the outer and the outer for the inner.

As to method, there is only one -- you must come to know yourself -- both what you appear to be and what you are.

M: There is only seeing; both the seer and the seen are contained in it.

In every concrete situation there is only the necessary and the unnecessary.

M: There is only imagination.

M: There is only life.

There is only love in action.

M: In reality there is only perception.

In the end there is only endless worry for the Guru and bitterness for his disciples.

Without it there is only chaos.

M: On the level of duality it may be so, but in reality there is only the source, dark in itself, making everything shine.

There is only light.

There is only light, all else appears.

M: There is only one mind, which swarms with ideas; 'I am this, I am that, this is mine, that is mine'.

In reality there is only one state; when distorted by self-identification it is called a person, when coloured with the sense of being, it is the witness; when colourless and limitless, it is called the Supreme.

In fact, there is no body, nor a world to contain it; there is only a mental condition, a dream-like state, easy to dispel by questioning its reality.

There is only the Supreme.

Surely, there is only one self and you are that self.

Maharaj: Before anything can come into being there must be somebody to whom it comes.

Q: Still there must be some real difference, I come to you, you do not come to me.

Interest there must be and steady remembrance.

M: For witnessing, there must be something else to witness.

There must be a purpose.

There must be a third factor at the root of it.

Q: There must be some link between your world and mine.

It makes sense, there must be a plan behind it.

Q: There must be some difference.

Q: Surely there must be a difference between forgetting and not knowing.

For bliss to arise there must be meeting, contact, the assertion of unity in duality.

There must be a reason for this difference.

Q: Still there must be some way of making out who has realised and who has not.

M: As long as there is consciousness, there must be pleasure and pain.

There must be a receiver.

There must be a push from within and pull from without.

There must be a source from which all this flows, a foundation on which all stands.

There must be a way out, independent of ripening which needs time, of sadhana which needs effort.

As a matter of fact, before you can experience anything, there must be the sense of being.

But surely behind these private worlds there must be a common objective world, of which the private worlds are mere shadows.

There must be a way to quieten the mind.

Q: Surely there must be something in common between the many points of consciousness we are.

Addiction to pleasure, at whatever cost, is so universal that there must be something significant at the root of it.

There must be love in the relation between the person who says 'I am' and the observer of that 'I am'.

There must be something continuous to register discontinuity.

M: There must be the desire first.

Acceptance or non-acceptance are superficial and accidental; reality is in all; there must be a way for all to tread -- with no conditions attached.

There must be some constant factor bridging the gaps in consciousness.

For knowledge to be, there must be separation and disharmony.

While there is grace on one side, there must be dedication to the task on the other.

As under a stone there will be darkness, however strong the sunlight, so in the shadow of the 'I- am-the-body' consciousness there must be ignorance and illusion.

Q: In love there must be duality, the lover and the beloved.

There must be some more important factor.

It is your ego that makes you think that there must be a doer.

There must be something wrong with the question itself, for you tend to repeat it again and again.

There must be certainty.

There must be the immense longing for truth, or absolute faith in the Guru.

There must be a cause for everything.

There must be reality beyond it.

Where tamas and rajas predominate, there must be war.

Surely there must be a mind to conceive the 'I-am-the- body' idea.

I can see that all depends on how the words are out together, but there must be somebody to put them together -- meaningfully.

But there must be the will to live.