THE PRACTICE OF SELF-ENQUIRY-PART I

[Guest guest]

THE PRACTICE OF SELF-ENQUIRY-THE RAMANA WAY

PART I

 

"Although the scriptures proclaim, "You are That", it is a sign of

weakness to meditate: "I am not this but That", instead of enquiring

what one is and remaining so; for one is always That". (Reality in

Forty Verses, v 32)

 

1-OVERALL PERSPECTIVE

 

"God made man in His own image" is an ancient saying. Man is thus

primarily made of the divine essence only. But he is now steeped in

ignorance shutting himself off from the knowledge of this divine

essence in him. The divine vocation in man is ineradicable; it may

be covered up for a time being, but it must well forth again. Man's

movements are generally directed only outwards since all the senses

in his body are turned outwards and tuned to absorb things only from

outside. When his activities are one-pointedly directed within,

turned within, he notices an entirely different nature of himself.

Weaned away from externalities, directing his attention inward he

recognizes the divine nature in him revealing itself in all

splendor. Anyone, thus turning within is bound to realize this

eternal truth within him; no one is excluded from this divine

consciousness. Man turning his attention outward by the very act

excludes himself from consciously experiencing it, though every man

even in his ignorance is not devoid of experiencing this divine

consciousness in himself. Whether he knows it or not every man is

filled with this Pure Consciousness, Pure Awareness. That which

clouds such awareness from his conscious experience is his habits to

cling to externalities, which are expressed in his discontent,

frailties, darkness and fear. Let him look within deeper and longer

and without fail he will notice this so-called "hidden and

mysterious" Self inhabiting his center, the source of his being.

Turning within from the externalities and paying full attention to

this source brings about a tremendous change in a man's life, since

for the first time he recognizes that he possesses this divine

essence within him. He understands the scriptural declaration: "You

are That" to mean "You are yourself That divine essence". Pure

Awareness, the "I AM"-ness in every man, is this essence of God.

 

This Reality that exists in everyman is Consciousness or Awareness.

No man can say he does not know it. By the very act of his denying

knowledge of it he declares its presence! The marks of the Reality

are that it always exists and it is able to exist by and in itself.

The Awareness in man exists always, by and in itself. Each man has

therefore within his grasp this opening to this eternal light

within. Once he has a glimpse of experience of this, his true being

within, which glows totally independently not needing his effort or

support for its existence - all his external activities need his

effort for their fructification – he will realize that he has passed

into a wonderful state, not depending on his five senses. This is an

experience, which he has never had before. An experience, which was

got without the aid of the five, senses and that too within himself

and by himself, is unique indeed. That day of having this vision in

oneself is the most starred day, for, on that day he is one with

eternity. Whoever engages in such inward exploration is no

dreamer, "he merely antedates today what the multitude of men will

have perforce to do tomorrow." Man therefore is a spiritual being

having this capacity to possess the Wisdom. He breathes this Truth

every moment! He thus contains a divine infinitude within him. This

infinite awareness is experienced as a perennial feeling of

unalloyed happiness – the "ananda"(bliss) aspect of the Eternal

Truth of "Satchidananda" (being-consciousness-bliss).

 

But, while stating the truth of our being thus, the head side of the

coin, should we not also observe the obverse of the coin? The

external world with its attractions and distractions devour man's

attention absorbingly and wholly. The complicated fastness of the

world outside to which the human system is so very strongly drawn,

attached, is forever drawing man more and more to involve himself

with matter, objects, activities external to oneself. Time too

rushes onward like a roaring stream carrying the human race along

with it and drowning them in its flux. In such a struggle – all the

time forced to run outward and forward endlessly, both physically

and mentally – if a man is asked to take a leap backwards, to dive

within, it will be nothing short of a feat of gymnastics! And to

tell such a totally tottered man about the divine awareness and the

need for him to turn inwards would be treated by him as

a "hallucination of human fancy and infantile idealism". If he has

to interest himself to take a right-about-turn in his life, that is,

to turn his conscious attention from his activities outward to

introspection inward he needs a good cause to do it.

 

What is that imminent cause?

 

Without further compelling him to involve himself yet again

externally, in the name of spiritual disciplines, ethical codes,

ritualistic regulations, he should be smoothly but firmly made to

turn within and expose him to the Truth that is his Being. Bhagavan

Sri Ramana Maharshi has opened up a Royal Path to attain

this "diving within" in the easiest, most direct and simple way. To

understand it clearly we will have to take up a microscopical

viewpoint, as till now we have been making only general observation.

That is, from the point of "human race" let us deduce our attention

to the "individual".

 

NOTE: TAKEN FROM: "BE THE SELF", BY V. GANESAN", PAGES 5 TO 17.