Sadhus Reminiscences of Raman Maharshi

Author(s): Arunachal Sadhu
Publisher: Ramanasramam Tiruvannamalai

Page 65

A Sadhu's Reminiscences of Ramana Maharshi
59
exactly the same. They are only mental concepts.” “You say that now” the other replied, “but you would not talk like that in a dream.” And then I woke up. The whole thing was intensely vivid.
Some people have failed to see how this applies to the above. But the point is that the dream was so real that I never questioned it to be anything but the waking state. The two were exactly the same.
That everything is in the mind and that the mind itself is only a passing phenomenon was continually stressed by Bhagavan. “Who is the one behind the mind?” he would ask repeatedly. “Find that one and the mind itself will automatically disappear.” To do this one must repeatedly seek out the source of the “I” by the enquiry “Who am I?”. This process has often been misunderstood, though actually Bhagavan's teaching is quite clear. In this search one is not to seek for some transcendental “I-Absolute”, but for the ego itself and the point where it arises. Find this, the ego automatically drops away and one then knows there is nothing but the Self. It is like following a stream to its source through the hills, and when one has reached that point whence it arises the stream itself will no longer exist. Source, mind, ego are one and the same and cannot exist apart from each other. The mind cannot know the Self, for how can it know that which is beyond mind? So it is impossible even for a Jnani to explain his state in words, which is only of the mind. To know it is to be it. There is no other way.