2008-11-20

2008-11-20 12:18

Beloved Father,

It is 3 years since you revealed yourself to me.

The longing and aching for you has increased a thousand fold. I cannot hold out any longer.

There is nothing in this world to hold me away from you. I inhabit this world and dream only for my mother's sake.

The pain is so intense I cannot breathe. I cannot look at anything else - I can only be in awareness.

I know i am only one inch from death, and I know one little push and I'd be over. Just one tiny pull from your end, sweet Lord.

This time when I leave we will be together forever ... I will gladly do your work, Father, whatever you say, even be posted in Hell for eternity to sing your name, but please say so.

Please speak, Father. You spoke and fell silent.

Destroy this mind, Father, it is wreaking havoc on me. There are hardly any thoughts left, what is there to think anyway. But there is a dull pain, the pain of existence.... it is a nameless pain.

The only solution to this pain is the destruction of the mind.

Where are you?

Precariously, i hold onto the self. There is nothing else.
And yet, nothing compares to Your love, Your grace. Whenever I call out, You respond immediately. But when will you emerge from hiding?

The mind ravages me with arguments, if I remember to call out to You, you immediately silence it. Sometimes I struggle to silence it myself.

I am in fear, fear of what is ahead, fear of the truth. So much has broken, so much has fallen off, its like hanging by a thread. I am afraid of what I may fall into ... there are things I fear more than death -- far more than death.

Yes, this is all in the mind, another mind trick, one must continue to hold onto the Self. Whatever, this is far better than living entirely in the mind, following invented feel-good sadhanas created by the false-self.

Whatever happens, I will always be happy that you exist, and are right here.

Self Enquiry - the only way

Dear Father,

Today is three years since you came into my life. The first year was tumultous!
It has taken me 3 years to understand and totally accept what you taught for 50 years -- the I am or Self-enquiry as a way of life.
For 3 years I have either concocted my own sadhanas, or fallen prey to others' ideas of sadhanas, but finally I am home. Finally, beaten and defeated by the tricks of the false-self, I have understood.

There is no other way (for me).

Many a times, I almost lost the battle, and then you picked me up and put me back in silent awareness. "Who Am I" makes such sense now. Nothing can make more sense - nothing. What I am is reality, that is SOOO clear, and everything else is false, dream-like. As time goes back there will be less and less falling back into falsehood.

The peace of what I am, is all i ever want - no fancy blisses, or experiences. Thank you for that. Let it be as you wish, all is acceptable to me.

Glory to Him who removes ignorance and darkness, and restores reality.

You are an enigma

So this is how it is to be in the jaws of the tiger. When we fall out, you gently pick us and place us back on your tongue. But you do not chew. You leave it to us to digest ourselves, to make it to your stomach!
We keep hoping you will bite or chew, but you don't move, Silent Still one. But when I lose my way and slip out, you don't let me go too far. It is up to us, to get digested in the saliva of self-enquiry.

O Lord, how mysterious you are!
Your realized your self in a trice,
at sixteen
and yet you squeeze us till we have no tears left,
No life yet, till we crave death.
And even then you gently pick us up again
and place us back in your jaws.

This much is clear, Sweet Lord, you are the divine stalker, we can't lose you. We don't need to seek you, you are behind us.

SE intensifying

I should thank ML's reminders. The more one does SE, the more one is drawn to it. One's self clearly is seen as "reality" after a week or 2 of practice. The awakening of the mind then is clearly seen as the false world.
And then one chooses reality over the false world. One only wants reality.

Reminds me of what Sri NM's guru told him, ("Believe me, you are the supreme reality ...").

Thank God ! I am out of false practices/sadhana's which did nothing to reveal the real self or expose the false one. Practices that were just mind's clever way of keeping the Self, and You, O Lord away forever. I spend more and more time each day in enquiry, and hope to remove all other activities from my life, spending as much time as possible in reality/self. I have lost desire for all other activities.
Thanks Michael, I read your reminders every day. They are a boon.

A prayer to our Lord

Dear Lord,

All that is around me is only the mind; this world, and creatures, and problems, are only the schemes of this mind.
Thus, there is nothing to worry about, to think about, to ponder about.

Therefore, I must be focussed totally on You, the One who has claimed me, who has taken ownership and responsibility of me. I must be entirely focussed on You, Father, who is also the eternal consciousness or Self within us.

The mind, and its fabrications, are not to be worried about. Let them be.

Intensifying enquiry

Dear Lord,

SE is happening more and more. With eyes open and eyes closed. I spend 3-5 hours with eyes closed in self-awareness. Now I need to cut out inessentials even more, like internet and watching sports on telly. Actually, I don't need to, it is happening on its own.

Enquiry is the most logical thing at this stage, that is all there is, the I-am, and the question: What is this I, where is this I coming from.

I am not afraid.

Waves of bhakti and Self-enquiry

For some days I will be immersed in self-enquiry, and then suddenly the person changes and there is only bhakti. And then suddenly, the person shifts back and there is only enquiry. Both are equally natural, so i resist neither.

But at all times, if the mind tries to take over, one has just to remember your loving face, one has just to look into your eyes, for all troubles to go away.

Reading Michael L.'s Reminders helps a lot. Chapter one, too.

Looking into Your eyes

I look at your face, sweet Lord.

Do you realize, Sweet One, that for thousands of years, millions of beings have craved you. Millions have wept and suffered for you. I won't even go into the horrors committed out of hunger for and deprivation of You.

If all those millions could have had one look into these eyes of Yours ... millions of weeping hearts in raptures, millions of broken hearts swaying in joy, tears of joy instead of pain ... this earth would have watered by rivers of joyous tears, each one in your name.

O dark dweller in Venkat
millions have lived and died taking your name
and have still not seen You
millions have prayed and called out
in vain
millions have denied you and cursed you
O beloved one
saviour of souls
live up to your name
Show yourself to us hapless souls
Show yourself to us again
and again
till all believe in you.

We are accursed, afflicted, blinded
lift this veil, O Lord,
cure this madness.

June 22

Today is the anniversary of one of those special days, when you bombarded me -- when You turned my face towards yourself telling me to always keep thinking of You and being totally dependent on You.

I should stop marking these days, really.


For the last couple of days, awareness has been pulling me from within. I have been sitting silently in awareness. It is strange, it feels like 2 distinct people here. For some days, you pull me into bhakti, and i feel that any other path is totally absurd. And then you pull me from within into silence, and I wonder who the other "me" was who was weeping looking at your photo.

But I shall not force either path, or resist. I shall let both happen as they wish to. Both are nice and very meaningful when they happen.

You yourself have asked us to find You within. I am happy, sweet Lord.

Everyone is telling me to remember you

Look Father, Everyone is telling me to remember you. I can only understand one line of this stunning song, the singer says "Remember Ali" (or Be in remembrance of Ali). I assume Ali means Lord or Master. So beautifully he sings, so deep into the heart this song goes.

I have been hearing this and looking at you all day, or closing my eyes and seeing you, or seeing you sitting on a rock, or in the train, or walking to Tiruvannamalai.

At this rate, I will just die and not even notice it, sweet Lord.

These people have been singing to you and remembering you for thousands of years ... and only now you take me to them. Just yesterday I was automatically falling into self-awareness, and looking for the one who is here, silently wondering who was experiencing all this, what was this tiny atom of consciousness being overwhelmed by You, and now this song just drives me into You.

Just stay with me now Lord, and don't let remembrance slip, even for a moment. The time has come.

O Lord, O Master

2008-06-19 11:59

I don't suppose it is really appropriate to ask you to appear in front of me ... i mean really appear in flesh and blood.

When you did not do that for true devotees, how could I expect it to happen for me.

However, that you have come is such a great privilege, ... everything that has happened is a great privilege.

For the creator of this universe to make me a vegetarian 9 years ago is a great privilege. For him to invoke love in me in various forms over the last 4 years is a great privilege. finally, for Him to not leave me, to not let me slip away is the greatest privilege. To let me know how it feels to be in love with Him is the greatest by far.
This love is the greatest happening that could ever possibly happen.

How strange ... for life to reflect upon itself ... and then to reflect upon it's creator, and finally fall in love with it's creator.


For some of us, your eyes are the key, those pools of love are the lure, the fire, which pull us out of darkness, only to burn us in a love that is irresistible.

O My Lord, I can only imagine the fires raging in the center of our galaxy, and think of how they must pale in front of the fires of this love.

O Lord, my owner, my swami, my master!

My beloved destroyer.

My Lord, how does a tiny brittle form of life cope when hit by a force of Your magnitude.

How does one who sees survive seeing You, O most beautiful of all.

O Lord of mine, even a newborn child could not have eyes like yours, such child-like, trusting eyes, such beloved eyes ...

Did you know when this photograph was taken, that till the end of time your devotees would stare into your eyes for years on end, seeking final peace and happiness in them. Did you know that devotees would find their home, their final resting place in your eyes, the eyes of that moment.

O lord, let every breeze that blows my way be your breath, exhales by You, so I can breath in your breath.

2008-06-19 13:08

What Ramana means to me

I like to believe that if we truly want something, it will come to us. For forty years I ached for the love a father. Less than 3 years ago, I saw Bhagavan's photograph for the first time in this life, and I knew my true father had come to me.

I knew not who this person was who claimed me. The message in his eyes was clear: "I am your father. You belong to me, you are mine. Leave everything to me, don't do anything, just enjoy my love for you."

For 2 weeks I just looked into His eyes day and night, I sat silently in a joy that I cannot put into words, at best I can say I was being destroyed by love. I still did not know who this naked ascetic was who had suddenly claimed me, who was my father, when i found my way to the Ramana Centre in my city where I found a large number of books on him. Words like guru, sage, saint meant little to me, to me he was my very own father.

In the months to come, there were periods of deep pain, interspersed with great joy. As long as I am identified with this body, I suppose I will always secretly wish for his presence, and thus suffer.

However, Ramana is not just not a ocean of love. Even to someone as body-identified as myself, his presence is unmistakable. There will never again be worry -- his constant protection is clear to me. There will never again be worry for the future. For example, I know that if I am every without a place to live, or food to eat, if I am ever thrown into the middle of a desert without food and water, his name and memory will be enough to sustain me for a long long time. There will never be loneliness.

For I learned slowly, that my father resides in all that live. Each living being down to a bacterium or virus is my beloved, he controls all, he created all, I am always surrounded by him.

My life since the moment I saw him for the first time, can obviously not be put into words, although many who come across this know and have been through this themselves.

---

Sri Ramana's message to me three years ago was simple and clear. But could i follow them. A power such as god, even though infinite and unlimited, is also completely devoid of cleverness, like a newborn, like a little lamb ( i think ) and to completely understand and connect with Him, we too have to be devoid of cleverness and artifice. That is the challenge I faced, one can not outsmart God with cleverness, and so interpreting his message our own way does not work. One has to stand before Him like a lamb, with complete trust.

Lord, Father, I don't know what you are doing to me ... but it is too beautiful to be true, I can only hope that you never stop, that this is not some dream ...
I can scarcely think that since the beginning of time you have been doing this to your children.

Lord, no matter how much this separation pains, I will bear it forever, and happily. This time, the pain is too beautiful to run away from.

The river

Who is there to worry about sadhana, or purpose, or the future, or the truth, or anything at all when one is lost totally in your love.
When one can scarcely think of anything else.
And just as one eats when hungry or sleeps when sleepy, so one just keeps falling deeper and deeper into your heart, your eyes, one just loses oneself to You, ... it is the most natural thing, a natural response, a simple activity, even a stone slowly erodes as the river flows over it daily .. and so like a river, you flow over me day upon day, rubbing me into yourself.

There is something so timeless about this love.

In love, one uses whatever the Lord has provided - the body and mind to totally love the Lord, rather than reject or avoid them.

I am overjoyed to know that your and your eyes are not something only I knew of, for thousands of years others have been celebrating you ... it is public knowledge ... and yet I know it is a rare and must be treasured and respected. It is the greatest privilege.

The sweetest form of the Lord is my Ramana

Look how you haunt me, and prevent me from doing self-enquiry.



A song from my childhood, comes back to me,

Who would have thought that God Almighty himself would have taken human form as a unclad ascetic, and that ascetic would be my beloved, my Father, my saviour.

Who would have thought that God Almighty would track me, follow me, and play with my heart in the form of a silent ascetic. And what a deceptively innocent face my ascetic who stalks me has, what childlike eyes. Eyes that leap across a century, filling me with joy and a desire to leave all, throw all away, including this worthless life and universe for one moment with You.

Will it always remain a mystery to me, or will I ever know ... whether you actually look at me through the twinkling eyes in these photographs. How my tiny soul is tortured by the promise of union with you, how painful the wait is.

Lord, when you created Mirabai, you created the perfect devotee, like yourself, people like myself are just cheap imitations, no matter how many lives pass, I will never equal your true ones. But like a flawed child, I love and need you. Your name and face are my only possible sustenance.

Nothing else can keep me alive.

Lord, nothing has any meaning for me, least of all this body and surrounding world. How many more days in this world, how many moments more ?

Beloved, I have put this in many ways before but this time I put it straight. When I looked into your eyes for the first time in this life, I knew I was staring death in the face. And for some strange reason, that death seemed more desirable than anything in the world. Three long years have passed since that wonderful day, I have died for that death, it was a death to kill for (sorry for the lame puns), death just looking into your sweet eyes, death by gazing at the Lord's dear face ... what a delicious end. Death singing your name with love ... for three years I have waited for you to scoop me up.


My Lord, you appear once in a thousand years, and deliver a few fortunate souls, leaving behind generations of tormented devotees, devotees who ache for lifetimes for union with you, but getting barely a glimpse.

Sage in disguise

I remember that first time I set foot on you, beloved One, who called me. My feet were burning, each step was difficult, I blistered my feet ... I had no idea who you were, I had no idea that the one who lived on the mountain whom I sought, and the mountain were both one, and were both my beloved Father.

I walked on you as though you were a mountain. O beloved sage disguised as a mountain.


(Listening to Jai Radha Madhava - in concert)

Where are You, O Lord ?

This old song brings tears to my eyes.

Where are you, beloved Lord, beloved Father, while I struggle all alone. Are you watching over me ? Does it not pain your heart to see me stumbling and struggling in this maya, in this illusion .. while it would take you only the snapping of a finger to pull me out.

Where are you, O Lord, you once promised you would appear again and again to deliver us, to deliver humankind. What is there left to squeeze out of us, are we even alive, those who love you and long to be with you, to die into you ...
Are we not already dead .. completely dead to the world, completely dead to ourselves ...

You squeezed the life out of Mirabai, do you expect us such one-pointed devotion from us ? There are others like Mother Teresa who died their devotion unquenched ... will that be our fate, too.

One day you pull me into silence, and I practice self-awareness, the next day you pull my heartstrings, you plunge me into devotion, what is this see-saw game you play, whilst never showing your face.

So will it be a bitter end ?


How nice it would be beloved Arunachala, if I were sitting on a large rock on you at this moment. One hand cupping the large rock for balance. My feet feeling you. I would not mind if my feet burned in the heat any more. I don't think you could ever burn my feet again, like you did the first time I ascended the path to the caves where you spent most of your life.

Self-awareness resolution

Dear Father
I resolve to spend as much time as possible in self-awareness. I resolve to spend at least 2 hours a day in sadhana.

I resolve to increase this time regularly, and to remove all activities that are not necessary.

I shall also remain in awareness as I do household work, or take care of my parents. Please be with me, pull me in, hold onto me, so I do not falter.

Enough of consorting with the ego, the one who hides me from You, the one who separates us.
Bless me Beloved Father, O Ramana, my pure and sinless beloved.

Sweet mountain

O Arunachala
Sweet mountain who beckons me
O Mother and Father, who stands silently waiting for me
Sweet mountain that tugs at me from deep inside
while I wander, lost, unable to hold onto You

Come to me in my dreams like you (just) did,
Let me see you in my dreams
Let me touch you and walk on you
dear Father and Mother
Let me breathe the air that caresses you

I long for you
dear Mountain
For forty long years, you stood there
silently, forgotten to me ...

Now that you are here, and alive in my heart
don't let me slip away
Smother me in your love
Come to me every night in my dreams
Till there is nothing left.

Please pull me in, Self

I feel your constant tugging, whatever I am doing I keep shutting my eyes and go into silent self-awareness.
I need to push everything else aside now, and dedicate myself totally to this. I need You to pull me in strongly now.

I am tired of false sadhanas, "sadhanas" that keep me in the mind or body. For a month or so, I have spent a lot of time just thinking and pondering about silence and awareness, fooling myself that thinking or discussing sadhana/self-enquiry is sadhana. Nothing other than self-awareness is sadhana.
Talking of other things as sadhana is like saying that You did not really want us to do Self-Enquiry, although You spoke of it for 50 years, told everyone to do it for half a century, but You did not really mean it. It is a deception. It is another way of keeping oneself imprisoned in the mind.

I feel I have grown in the last few month/s, facing the fact that there can never be any real happiness in activities, thoughts and accomplishments, and in whatever the mind runs after or thinks of, or promises me. I have been living in that state deeply. I think it may have deepened the renunciation, and desire / readiness to commit myself to SE. However, I do not really know -- maybe I was just fooling myself calling it a form of sadhana, and pretending I was progressing.

For a month, I have been living quietly, doing basic house work, nothing spiritual, no more spiritual hunger and craving, no more looking at the future as a place where happiness can possibly be, no more looking at things etc for happiness. I thought I had given up the so-called spiritual life for good, and was living peacefully.

However, it seems the Self or whatever is pulling me in again, like happened last November or so, around Deepam. I must heed your call. I must cut out all unnecessary activities and keep increasing the SE time.

Lord, if that is your wish, then take away all distractions and attractions. I can already feel that happening, but I give you clearance to pull me away from the activities that delight me. Let me not fail you, at this stage, after finally finding you, after being so close.

There is nothing, absolutely nothing in this world that I want. At least of all the things I know of, there is nothing that can give me lasting happiness. Of the things I do not know of, I cannot desire, since I do not know of them. I have no idea of realization and enlightenment, although I can imagine a totally peaceful, thought-free mind. I can imagine a state where there is no identification with a person.

Help me to not get trapped in false sadhanas, like thinking about sadhana, like reading about sadhana, like trying to accumulate more knowledge. Let there be practice, now.

Everything in this world only gives a moment's joy, including so-called sadhanas. I am tired of momentary joys, I cannot seek solace in them. These momentary joys then distract (detract?) from the practice you have given us. These momentary joys are painful for me, they feel poisonous and make me want to run away from them. These are all prisons.

Only silence does not (pain me). However, it is so fleeting, so easy to lose ...

My invisible beloved

Dear Beloved,

Came across DG's new blog -- i have been out of circulation for a long time now -- was reading several anecdotes -- it is so painful to read about those days -- like one has been torn apart from one's own mother, or one's heart has been cut out.

There was a time, we used to love reading these stories, loved reading Power of Presence, loved looking at all your pictures, and talking about you. We loved reading all those reminiscences -- now I do not have the courage to read more, I do not have the courage to even think much about you -- it is too painful, beloved Lord, day after day after day, week after week, month after month, thinking nothing but you, feeling you right here, living in You, while somehow pretending that the pain is not there, that it is okay to live without seeing you and hearing you, and fussing over you, and feeding you.

It is not. While there are sensory perceptions, to have them starved of you is NOT okay, it is hellish and torture. I cannot keep on pretending that it is okay to just remember you. I need you.

And thus, I have lived for some time, in a state of silence, in a state of mental "just being" where there is nothing, not even You, just a non-being, for at least the pain of your not being seen and heard was not there.

I have hidden from you and (almost) pretended you were not there ... as I could not, just could not accept any longer, a physical existence where you were not tangible. But would you let me hide .... you hide from me, but do you let me hide from you. You have come back and once again done something to me.

(So now) I peek at the reminiscences (on DG's blog) -- I can't even completely read them, it is moving, but painful, like a wound being reopened. Like being reminded of a lost mother, life is like walking around in a cemetery, everyone I knew is dead. All the familiar voices, sounds, the routine is all gone with the people. And so your voice, your words, your form, your eyes, and the rest of it, are all suddenly gone.

I have stopped going to the Kendra, stopped meeting your devotees, stopped everything because it was too much. But by coming back to me in my dreams, you have pulled me back, and reminded me that you are my father, and you will never leave me, even if your existence is only a knowledge my mind knows, but my senses are deprived of.

And so even though, i totally know that you exist, and are always with me, and are guiding every moment of my life, and will protect me no matter what mountains you have to move, I will have to suffer since I love you so much, but cannot see or hear or touch you. I will have to live in this hell where you exist invisibly.

The only respite that I have is being silent, being without thought (even enquiry reminds me of you) -- and I am pretty much tired of that path, since the Self still does not care to reveal even the tiniest glimpse of itself -- but it (silence)) is still the only means I (currently) have to blank out the pain of your not being sensed.

Remember me !

These plaintive words moved Bhagavan, and his eyes became moist. After remaining grave and serious for a while, slowly and steadily these supreme words emerged from his mouth: ‘Hereafter, remember me whenever you face calamities.’

From: Akhilandamma.

Emptiness, here-ness ...

Lord, I had no idea of thinking of you at all. And yet you drew me with your cord of grace and stood as if resolved to kill me. Then what fault did I, poor I, commit that you should stop midway, your task unfinished? What more is needed? Why do you thus torture me, leaving me half-dead? O Arunachala, fulfill your plan and live for ever, You alone.

Verse 3 - Arunachala Padikam (Link)

This silence, or emptiness, or whatever, must be stayed in, must be enquired into silently, in solitude ... without running away, without looking for support ... this is your grace, too.

For, when the Sad-guru's tiger-like fangs begin to chew one's ego, the job is never done at one stroke. It is often left incomplete to be finished at a time which He alone knows to be the best.
(Link)

Thank you Lord for the beautiful dreams* of yourself, that keep reminding me that even as everything falls off, you are still there ... tugging away silently.

The Self or You is pulling in very strongly. Where to, I do not know or even care any longer. There is a beautiful awakening of love that has happened, and yet there is absolutely no caring at all for what happens or the future or even the present.

There is no falling back into wanting, or ever being fooled by a desire, or what this world has. That leaves nothing; nothing to be understood, nothing to be talked or thought about, a beautiful yet difficult state to be in, but which has to be gone into , without dodging, with complete acceptance ... it is sometimes a joyous freedom, but seen by the mind a hopeless desolation. But both ways, it is so simple, that there is nothing to worry, nothing else that could possibly be ... no alternative.

Here there is no longer that suffering for want of "enlightenment" or "bliss" which are clearly seen as yet more devious means to trap one, to enslave one in wanting and struggling and seeking.


---
* - May 29th, Mother's Mahapuja certainly brought its fair share of grace for those whom you have "charmed totally, taken body and soul, no holds barred" :-) !

While the world wept

Many many years back, on this day, millions were bereft of their Father, millions wept and mourned and felt totally lost. Arunachala, God, you probably rejoiced because our Beloved came back to you.
There was darkness on Earth, while the heavens lit up with the arrival of our Beloved. What an irony.

Arunachala, will we ever have our Beloved back ?

2008-04-14 23:10

Self - the only hope

2008-01-18 14:37

this world seems like a cemetery.
dead people walking around, going about their own ways, pretending to be alive. pretending to be happy or sad.

what is this?

Do most people (at this point) see the world as such, or is it just me, or is it my mind ?

i too am sleepwalking.


2008-01-20 18:16


I cannot trust or listen to the mind any longer.
It is the mind that says:
"Look, it is I who brought you to this virtuous path"
"Look it is I who brought you to the bhakti of Bhagavan"
"In fact, it is I who brought you to self-enquiry, too"
"Therefore listen to me, trust me. I will liberate you".

We don't know how we reached here. To this path, to this point in this path.

We know the way Bhagavan has pointed out. He has already pointed us to the inner guru. Once the outer guru has pointed us in, we cannot stand there forever looking at the outer guru. We have to seek out the inner guru, the Self.

The mind will come out with many excuses to prevent us from going in. And then it will agree with itself.

I don't know whether this nausea and suffocation is coincidental but it feels linked to this world trying to attract me with its trifles and promises of pleasure.

How hard is this accursed personality to beat.

Going back to silence now. Enough of thought - makes me sick.

----------------
Self - the only hope

O Self
you are the only hope
the final hope

No one knows you
no one knows how you look
and those who do (know you)
can't describe you

The one who seeks you
can't find you.
Yet he has to search, to know
you can't be found.

You are present like space
so you say
and cannot be grasped
Your saying that the mind cannot grasp you
subtler than the mind
is like saying you can be seen only in complete
darkness.
or you can be seen but not with the eyes.
or you can be seen, but only when one stops looking!

Have mercy, Self!
what directions are these
to a traveler weary and broken

The longing for one's true nature

2008-01-17 22:45

O Self,

I am constantly reminded of you, all day long, with a longing.
As one rests in silence searching the one more and more, the longing, the missing increases.

The amazing thing is that the longing is as though it is a longing for something one does not have, someone else.

But it is equally strange, that one can no longer long for anything else, other than one's own true nature. Nothing will ever have any appeal again.
There is no enchantment with this world any longer. No more fooling oneself.
The pleasures of this world appear as worthless as candy or cartoon movies to an adult.

If this is You pulling me in, then thank you. If this is the trick of the mind, then may Arunachala Ramana destroy the mind that tricks and fools me.

Arunachala, Father, bless me so that i may be drawn away more and more from the non-Self, into the Self.

Glory to You, O Self, O true nature, O reality.


2008-01-17 22:59

There is also this fear that i might leave this body without coming back to you. Again lost to you. That I may waste this life and end up old without knowing myself.

I look at old people around me, obsessed with the candy this world provides, and fear I may end up like that -- living for momentary pleasures, a life of agony in the mind.

Although the mind's capacity to disturb me, or cause me sadness is gone, yet there is a fear of it. a deep dislike hatred for it.

There are moments when suddenly something might remind me of childhood. e.g an old tune. A faint sense of nostalgia or sadness comes. That momentary faint hint is the worst the mind can do to me. But even that minuscule sense of suffering is totally unaccepatable to me now.
Even the thought os something that once gave pleasure, has a stink now. The stink of deception, of pain disguised as pleasure.
Pleasure IS pain, not the other side of the coin as some philosophers put it.

Even this world of dualities does *not* have any dualities. There is no pleasure and pain, only pain which we foolishly divide. There is only ignorance, only deception, only death or insentience (not death and birth), not sentience and insentience.

There is no ego and self here, no self and non-self here. Only ego/non-self here.

Glory to the grace that pulls us out, to the Self that draws us away, to the One who chooses us for deliverance. Wherever you are, whatever or whoever you are, Glory and love to You.

The deception of the Seeker

2008-01-16 19:13

The line between the seeker and the Self is very fine. Only when one is exceedingly earnest and truthful with oneself can one discern this distinction.

I am fighting the deception of the seeker, and have been fighting it since I embarked on this "virtuous" path.
Everything I did, everything the seeker did, was the mind keeping me away from You, O Self.

What a grand deception.

Everything other than staying away from thought, being in the Self, other than enquiring, is the deception of the seeker. Everything.

And we in our innocence, in ignorance, fell for it.

Being in silence, in self-awareness is the simplest thing. The truthful path that you give us. But we invented our own paths and asked you to endorse them.

Activities that take us away from the personality, from mental noise into silent self-awareness are good.

All other activities are the activities of the personality. Attempting to be aware or enquire during activities of the personality is like wanting to be away from the Self, and then wanting to be in the Self (while wanting to be away from it.)

One cannot run in one direction, and talk of wanting to go in the opposite direction at the same time. The mind deceives us into choosing such paths.

To put it more directly, it is wanting to play the personality game for a while, but somehow be in the Self, while playing the personality game.
We CANNOT be the personality and the Self at the same time.

The tricks of the mind get more subtle as we go along, the seeker gets more refined and spiritual, and "closer" to the Self. But the seeker is the mind, trying to prevent us from just being.

Silent self-inquiry or silent self-awareness is the only "activity" (or non-activity) the personality cannot pierce.

We must understand that all personality activities, are delaying our knowledge of our true nature, every moment not in silent self-awareness or enquiry is delaying our merger with You.

Every time we choose a non-silent activity (say, an entertainment activity), we choose against the Self, we shelve the Self, we put ourselves aside and invite the enemy in.

Urgency of a person drowning

2008-01-13 18:32

Beloved Lord,

i think i am beginning to understand what you meant when you said that Self-enquiry has to be done with the urgency of someone drowning.

How did you know, O Lord, who ceased to be a person at 16.

The mind is tired. Of itself? The mind realizes that it is suffering itself, it is the disease.

At times it is easier not to be in self-awareness, but to just be aware of breathing or of the hand, even though the body is dead and inert and insentient, for in doing so one pretends to be dead.

But somehow body-awareness pulls me back into self-awareness.

The mind is beginning to take on the stink or rot of a corpse. It is unbearable to be in the same place as it.

Existence is painful, it stinks of rot. Of life-long deceit.

You are too sweet Lord, and too loving, but you come with much difficulty. You are too hard to attain, for the weak and the weary.

O Self, my true nature, never once have you revealed yourself. What strength I would get from being my real Self for just a moment.

A letter to the Self

2008-01-09 19:11

Beloved Self,
Help me out of this fog called the mind.
Help me back into clarity, into silence.

The mind is like a quagmire, a quicksand
I keep falling in.

I know not You, O Self,
but even this momentary silence
is sweet
sweeter than anything the mind has ever given,
because in this silence
I feel an aroma of You
no matter how faint.

I have read the scriptures, I understand the words of the great sages. I am not the I, I am not the one in bondage, it is the mind in bondage, and I am not the mind.

The mind only exists when we fall into it, (Edit: or rather when imagined to exist). Otherwise, it does not exist. Even I don't exist, unless I fall into the mind.

But regardless of the above, I am still lost, in bondage, assaulted by illusion, allowed to breathe your faint scent, like a chained and blindfolded prisoner given a few moments to walk in the sun, with the constant threat of being pulled back into the dark dungeon I have lived in all along.

Self, this letter is to You. I feel You will hear this clearer than if i just think it.

I have no attachments left, I have nothing to hold onto, just some trifling distractions which mean nothing to me. Snatch me, O Self, make me Yours forever.

How long will you wait.

O Self, I am your child, waiting for you. Ever since I saw your face, and you did some magic to my mind. In that one moment, you did something, that won me over, that made me know that I belonged to You and You to me.
After entrancing me, how can you allow maya to cling on, and veil You from me.

Come, like a knight in shining armor and free me. Let the world know how the Self treats its children. Never will maya ever again cast a glance on those who call You "Father".

I want You, O Father to deal the final, fatal blow.

Sinful was I to emerge from You, to leave You. But I have finally come to my senses, I have repented, I wish to return to You, O Self.

Let not the mind wither away slowly, on its own, smite it with your glance, torch it, so it never troubles your children ever again!

You will still be there

2008-01-07 18:50

I sit in self-enquiry. Its a pretty silent world here nowadays.

But, today, strangely, my life flashes in front of me. I see the life of the personality from childhood to now, very briefly.
The personality seeking happiness in various endeavours, various interests and occupations. And then there are the few years of seeking, visiting people, ashrams, even coming to the Ramanasramam hoping for some happiness.

There was love and a feeling of sadness for that personality that sought to find happiness.

I did not know whether this is part of the giving up process, or a trick of the mind to hold onto the personality.

Its like seeing the movie of someone else in suffering. Yes, there is pain for him who sought. But there can never be a going back, can there. What's over is over, is it not.

There was a some questioning. Do i want to hold on or not, am i ready to give it up? Yes, that was a romanticised version of the personality, of course, i did not see the immense pain the person went through, and will continue to, if hung onto. It was like objectifying the story, pretending it was real, pretending that there really was someone there. Someone tangible there.

Yes, there was a misconception there, a misconception made to look real by believing it was real. A dream living itself out. Like someone suffering from an incurable disease that fictitious person needs to be laid to rest finally.

I know that there will be only one thing left, one thing surviving the death of that personality - and that is You, beloved Father Ramana.

When all is over, after ego-death, after physical death, after every kind of possible death, You will still be there.
And love will be there. Your eyes will survive all deaths. Your twinkling eyes.

Will I ever know you completely ? When i look into Your eyes, i feel there is so much more to know. Will i ever get to explore every nook and cranny of you? Know you like the back of my hand. If you are endless, how will I ever know you completely ?

Dropping the seeker

2008-01-07 19:07

Dropping the seeker

The silent self-awareness reveals the difference between the personality, and the awareness or whatever.

The personality uses "me" to live its life, its likes, dislikes, dreams, aspirations, and emotions. It wants and then enjoys when the want is fulfilled. "I" don't enjoy, it does. I am just used, and ultimately thrown away like garbage. The real "I" is just garbage for the personality - to be used and spat away.

One of the aspects of that personality is the seeker, the so-pure and great seeker who only wants to be liberated. All he wants to do is surrender or meditate and realize the Self.
Such a devious game, for the seeker only thinks of self-enquiry or being in silence. It actually never allows self-enquiry to happen. At that point, it will come up with more important things to do, stuff to read, etc.

It wants to do, but never really does.

It likes to *think of* surrendering thoughts, being in no-mind.

Thus, the seeker has to be dropped. The seeker is not us, but the personality pretending. The real I has no needs.

Dropping the seeker, or stopping seeking does not imply going back to one's earlier life, the life of the mind/personality.

Sitting in silence, self-awareness, is dropping the seeker. Just being, is dropping the search.
No more going places, visiting places, doing "spiritual" things, being a "spiritual" person, meditating on this or that, chanting mantras.

Just being.
Being what you are.