Advaita

[Guest guest]

I wrote this for the Advaita list, but thought it might be useful out here

too :

 

The fundemantal doctrine of Advaitam is 'tat tvam asi' ie you're the

Truth - brahman. And that brahman is one without a second ie it only

exists - as YAgnavalkya says in the BrhadAranyakOpanishad, "When you're all

there is, what else is there to see, to hear ...".

 

But then we can hardly relate this to our empirical experience. We exist and

we see people, animals, trees, things all around us - quite distinct from

us. So how does Vedanta say that all this variety that I see around me is

nothing but me?

 

So what's that which makes us think that we're different from all that which

exists around us? It's our individuality - our personality - our sense of

being an entity by itself quite different from the rest.

 

So let us analyze the crux of this issue - ourselves - individuality,

personality, identity etc

 

Generally when you ask somebody who they are, they generally start off

with saying their name - but then name is just something which the

parents gave you. It's just a word - a label to address you. If my

parents had named me "Anand" instead of "Nandakumar", I would currently be

saying that my name is Anand.

 

So who am I?

 

People then generally start saying that they're the son of their parents,

the brother to their sisters, the officer in the organization they work in,

their role in the society etc

 

Even here personal identification is only with respect to something else -

as a son to the parents, as the brother to the sisters, as the position in

an organization - in relation to something, but never reveals what you're in

yourself.

 

When people run out of options, they finally state that they're the body and

mind.

 

Accepted that in the waking state one is the body/mind and in the dream

state one is the mind, but in deep sleep state we lose consciousness of

ourselves and are neither body and mind. But then whatever we are we still

are, to the extent that when we wake up we're still able to retain our

identity.

 

So that which exists in deep sleep is what we are, but we have no

awareness of it. It's this which we are in essence which is the same in all

beings - living and non-living - brahman.

 

But if we are that, why is that we have our individuality - our personal

life, with its passions, desires, successes, failures, misery etc

 

If you take a new born baby - it just stares at us, without comprehension -

and AFAIK, all new born babies within a couple of months after their birth,

cannot recognize their parents and generally will go to anybody. It has no

sense of personality - it just is.

 

But then when it starts experiencing new things in the world - slowly its

personality builds up. It sees it father and mother identifies itself as

their son/daughter, its brothers and sisters and identifies as their

brother/sister, its house, surroundings, neighbours and play things -

develops a personality in relation with them.

 

This process continues with all that it experiences and slowly over a period

of time its personality is established - but only with respect to what it

had experienced in the world - but not what it itself is. In short, a person

is nothing but the sum total of all that he has experienced.

 

And this sense of selfhood - this individuality is the greatest mAyam. It's

due to this sense of selfhood that we develop attachment to objects,

experience pain and pleasure, happiness and misery in this world. This is

what YAgnavalkya means in his dialogue with Maitreyi, that it is only due to

the self that everything - parents, wife, children, property etc - are dear.

The self referred

to here is the personality, which was developed due to the life of

experience. This personality has no existence of its own apart from whatever

it has experienced in life - it only exists in relation to something else.

 

When we watch a movie, subconsciously we get the feeling that we're part of

the movie - that we along with the characters experience whatever they

experience - but in truth we don't. Life is like that - we observe and

watch, without truly being affected by it. But due to the mAyam of selfhood,

we are deluded into thinking that we are.

 

SamnyAsam is nothing but the negation of this life of experience to weed out

this false self. All activity - both physical and mental - only strengthens

this false sense of selfhood (and this is what is meant by accumulation of

karma - for the stronger the sense of selfhood, the farther one is away from

moksham, which is nothing but abiding in oneself). And as can be experienced

by anybody, even the slightest activity involves duality - a subject and an

object - you and that which you experience - and both the subject and the

object only exist in relation to one another. If the reader finds it

difficult to understand - it is because to know from somebody that

you as an individual don't exist, is quite different from knowing and

experiencing yourself that you as an individual don't exist.

 

Complete cessation of activity - karma - is what destroys or rather ceases

to give rise to this false self and lets us abide in ourselves - which is

without individuality. And don't think this is simple - the KathOpanishad is

not exaggerating when it says that walking the path is like walking on the

edge of a razor!

 

True philosophy - be it Patanjala Yoga or the MAdhyamaka school of Buddhism

or our Advaitam, is nothing but a reductionist movement - neti, neti - which

systematically negates whatever

you are not - the senses, the body, the mind and finally the personality -

to arrive in yourself - that which is beyond expression. It's beyond reason,

because reason presupposes you who reasons.

 

True knowledge is not mere bookish knowledge, but knowledge of oneSelf.

Whatever your status in life, always meditate - try to know and be yourself

- half an hour meditation is worth more than a month of reading. It's in the

silence in meditation - when all activity has ceased - when you cease to

even "know" or "be aware", that a subtler form of awareness (which is not to

be confused with psychological awareness, consciousness) arises. And You are

That.