Swami Atmananda's post

[Guest guest]

>By the discrimination between the eternal and the ephemeral

>we imply, the conviction that 'Brahman (the eternal & omnipresent

>consciousness) alone is the one real entity, and everything else is

>transitory'.

 

Is mere conviction enough?

 

If one has not even have an inkling of what he is how can he practice

vairagya? To practice vairagya one should know the Real, which is

different from the unreal. That way one can develop attachment to the

real and non-attachment to the unreal. Even if one knows the Real,

developing vairagya is very difficult as the Katha Upanishad says :

"walking on the edge of the razor". But without knowing it, I doubt if

anybody will have the stimulus to develop vairagya. Their mind will talk

them out of it :-)

 

Please confirm if Adi Shankara himself states that mere conviction is

sufficient.