Guest guest Posted September 21, 2006 Report Share Posted September 21, 2006 Help on the Quest for Self-realization-Reminders-65 The essence of a man is pure Spirit or, which comes to the same, pure Being or pure universal Consciousness. The mind creates an ego, a seemingly complete, autonomous individual self, which, although, illusory, seems to be the reality of one. Masters say that Self-realization is not something new to be achieved but an eternally existent state to be discovered or revealed. To do this constitutes the effort of which teachers and scriptures speak. The effort involves the will and the emotions as well as understanding and therefore has to be persistent, determined and skilled. The campaign must be skillful and intelligently planned. The goal in all cases is the same: the taming or destruction of the ego or the discovery that it never really existed. Question the very existence of the ego by Self-enquiry. Every path requires two things of the seeker: purity of life and right effort. No one need give up normal life. What is necessary is to abandon altogether the thought "I am the doer" and get normally established in Pure Being. The path of Self-enquiry requires no ritual or forms of worship, no priesthood or congregation, no outer signs or special observances, but can be practiced in the workshop or kitchen or city office as well as in the monastery or hermitage. Also, it requires no great burden of theory. The Direct Path is to forget the ego and discover the Self, not as one self discovering another, but by awakening Self-awareness of the Self, by beginning, occasionally and imperfectly at first, but ever more constantly and powerfully, to be the Self. It is in this sense that knowing is being. The direct path awakens love through knowledge. It is not knowledge of one by another or mind-knowledge, but the awakening bliss of the Self to which the mind is drawn and in which it is absorbed in love. By Self-knowledge is not meant any psychological study but knowing and being the Self which exists behind the ego or the mind. Source: Various reliable publications of / on Sri Ramana Maharshi's teachings. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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