Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi Complete ... - BrahminVoice.org

Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi
Go to the root of the thoughts and you reach the stillness of sleep. But you
reach it in the full vigour of search, that is, with perfect awareness.
That is again jagrat-sushupti spoken of before. It is not dullness; but
it is Bliss. It is not transitory but it is eternal. From that the thoughts
proceed. What are all our experiences but thoughts? Pleasure and
pain are mere thoughts. They are within ourselves. If you are free
from thoughts and yet aware, you are That Perfect Being.
Lady Bateman appreciated the discourse and thanked Sri Bhagavan.
Later, she said that she would be leaving the next day.
Sri Bhagavan smiled and said: You do not leave one place for another.
You are always stationary. The scenes go past you. Even from the
ordinary point of view you sit in your cabin and the ship sails but
you do not move. We see a picture of a man running several miles
and rushing towards us but the screen does not move. It is the
picture that moves on and away.
D.: I see, but I can understand it only after I realise the Self.
M.: The Self is always realised. Were Realisation something to be
gained hereafter there is an equal chance of its being lost. It will
thus be only transitory. Transitory bliss brings pain in its train. It
cannot be liberation which is eternal.
Were it true that you realise it later it means that you are not realised
now. Absence of Realisation of the present moment may be repeated at
any moment in the future, for Time is infinite. So too, such realisation is
impermanent. But that is not true. It is wrong to consider Realisation to
be impermanent. It is the True Eternal State which cannot change.
D.: Yes, I shall understand it in course of time.
M.: You are already That. Time and space cannot affect the Self. They are
in you; so also all that you see around you are in you. There is a story
to illustrate this point: A lady had a precious necklace round her neck.
Once in her excitement she forgot it and thought that the necklace was
lost. She became anxious and looked for it in her home but could not
find it. She asked her friends and neighbours if they knew anything
about the necklace. They did not. At last a kind friend of hers told her
to feel the necklace round the neck. She found that it had all along
been round her neck and she was happy! When others asked her later
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