From ‘Bhagawan Nityananda of Ganeshpuri’ by Swami Muktananda Paramahamsa

Bhagawan uttered three phrases that continue to have profound meaning for me. He said, “Nirmala mana; nischala mana; vishala mana.” (Purified mind; unwavering mind; immutable mind that is vast, that is eternal.)



The sages have spoken about three types of siddhis. There are impure powers acquired through unclean vows and incantations. After the practitioner bathes and becomes clean, he can no longer perform them. This kind of power has only evil effects …….

Then there are mantra siddhis, acquired by saying a mantra to a particular deity under certain circumstances. This kind of power allows you to manifest a piece of fruit or an ornament in your hand, or move an object from one place to another. Such miracles impress and attract people for a time, but this kind of magic does not last long.

Then there are true siddhis, those described in the scriptures. These powers are acquired by practicing with rigorous discipline the eight steps of ashtanga yoga. These steps require virtuous behavior, physical discipline, the ability to restrain the senses from their outward pull, concentration, and deep meditation that reaches the state of unity-consciousness.

Far beyond these three siddhis, however, is a supreme power, the mahasiddhi. This is not acquired by one’s own efforts. It is a gift from God, and it always brings His presence.



According to the scriptures, there are four kinds of beings one should never approach empty-handed: gods, Gurus, kings and children.



…. describes the shambhavi mudra as “Attention turned inward, gaze outward, without any blinking of the eyes.” Gurudev was often in this state.



The deity worshipped through the image does not reside in the wood or stone or clay of which the image is made, but in the feeling of the worshipper. For this reason the feeling of devotion must never be given up.



When Kundalini is awakened, a new vitality spreads through every pore of the body and a process of inner purification begins. In the beginning there may be overwhelming drowsiness, tremors, perspiration, sensations like electric shocks, tremendous heat, feelings of intense joy, spontaneous physical postures, and then a state of deep meditation like Samadhi. The seeker may have the inner Darshan of gods and goddesses, or of Siddhas. He may experience heaven or the realm of ancestors. He may see lights and hear inner music during meditation, or even during the waking state.

……. the purification of these chakras begins. All the fluids of the body are rejuvenated. The incoming and outgoing breaths are equalized ……… the power of one’s karmas weakens and disappears, and liberation in this very life is attained.



The Bhagavad Gita says
shraddhavanl labhate jnanam [4.39]
One who possesses faith attains knowledge.



He had a big belly because of long, inner retention of the breath, called kumbhaka.



The great saint Brahmananda said, “Become ashes at the Guru’s feet and then you will meet God.” We have to allow the Guru to work on us, we have to dissolve our ego and pride at his feet.



In India, there were many yogis who were able to manifest the power of levitation. They had to spend a lifetime learning how to do it, but it's not so extraordinary. They awaken the Kundalini energy through pranayama, and then they practice three yogic locks or bandhas. They stay in these positions for a very long time. The fire of yoga eventually burns up the water and the earth elements in the body. These are the two elements that make the body heavy, so when they are burned up, the person can levitate instantly. It's a strenuous practice. My Babaji was able to do it.



…… he called me ….. and said, “……. Whats that you’re carrying …..”

“It's an Upanishad,” I said.

“Dust!” he said ……. He went on, “Do you know how this book was written? Books are created by someone’s mind. ….. Instead of reading someone else’s mind, meditate and then read your own mind …… Meditate a lot. When you meditate a lot, true knowledge will spring forth from you. You won't have to read books. Inner knowledge is far superior. Write your own book with your own mind……”



A little health, wealth, learning and power seem to make a person so bold that he begins to advise and teach even God Himself.



A seeker once asked a sage, “Who is God? Who is the supreme Principle? Who is Consciousness?”

The sage answered, “The witness of your mind is God.”



If a person cannot sit still, it is very difficult for the mind to become still. ……To move the mind inward, a still posture is necessary. …… Just by remaining still in this posture that I am sitting in now, all the seventy-two million nadis of the body are purified.



He would say, “Just as abusive terms pierce you, in the same way, my speech should enter you, it should pierce you. Then you’ll attain That immediately.”



My Baba never liked to criticize any religion, sect, or person. If anyone found fault with someone else, he would say, “Hey! You have faulty vision. Ram is in all.” This is the sign of a supreme Siddha.

Once a devotee of my Baba came to him and complained about another devotee. “That man drinks liquor and eats fish,” he told Baba.

“So what?” Baba said. “No matter what he eats or drinks, he shits it out the next day. He doesn’t hang on to it, so why should you?” No matter what you may have done in the past, you should let go of it. If the thought “I am a sinner” arises, then have another thought: “I am not a sinner. I am meritorious.”

……. a faultfinder can never become a good seeker ……



My Baba always said it is not the Guru’s grace toward the disciple that matters; it is the disciple’s grace toward the Guru that is of much greater importance. The moment a disciple surrenders himself completely to the Guru, the Guru’s grace will be bestowed automatically and in full measure.



The inner Shakti flows particularly through the feet. In our culture when a saint arrives in someone’s house, the host offers to wash the saint’s feet.



A photograph has great power. What kind of power depends upon whose picture it is. ……… I fully believe in the power of my Baba’s photographs.

If you want to establish a connection with Nityananda Baba, just look at his eyes in the photograph and repeat your mantra. In this way the Shakti will enter you. Then automatically the relationship will be established.



We worship the Guru in a personal form so that we may receive Shakti and meditate effectively …… The image of the Guru is not form; it is pure Consciousness …… The mind and the senses have their pressing demands, they must have their corresponding objects. The eyes must see. That is why it is good to worship the statue or the personal form of the Guru. When the mind rises to a high state it converts the form into the formless.

From ‘The New Path. My life with Paramahansa Yogananda’ by Swami Kriyananda

Years later, on learning that the cow, in India, commands special affection, an amusing comparison occurred to me. The Indian is, himself, in some ways cow-like: slowly ruminative, reflectively chewing the cud of his ideas. By contrast, Americans, who love dogs, seem actually to have a certain affinity with them, as they dash about in mad pursuit of endless and quite unnecessary goals, eagerly wagging their tails in an effort to be liked.



Civilized man prides himself on how far advanced his present state is from that of the primitive savage. We look condescendingly on his tribal way of endowing trees, wind, rain, and heavenly bodies with human personalities. Now that science has explained everything in prosaic terms, modern man considers himself wiser for having lost his sense of awe. But I’m not so sure that he deserves congratulations ……. Too pragmatic, now, to worship, he has forgotten how to commune. Instead of relating sensitively to Nature around him, he shuts it out of his life with concrete “jungles,” air conditioning, and “muzak”; with self-promotion and noisy entertainments. He is obsessed with problems that are real to him only because he gives them reality. ……

Modern technology alienates us from the universe and from one another. Worst of all, it alienates us from ourselves. It directs all our energies toward the mere manipulation of things, until we ourselves assume qualities that are almost thing-like. ….. We are taught to behave in this world like uncivilized guests, rudely consuming our host’s plenty without offering him a single word of thanks in return. Such is our approach to nature, to God, to life itself. We make ourselves petty, then imagine that the universe is petty also. ….. And when, in “civilized” smugness, we approach the question of religion, we address God Himself as though He had better watch His manners if He wants a place in our hearts.



The Hindu scriptures state ….. that what is otherwise a duty ceases to be such when it conflicts with a higher duty. Man’s highest duty is to seek God. It is understood in India that one’s spouse can and should be supportive in one’s search. Only if the desire for God is intense, and one’s spouse poses an obstacle to that search by his or her worldliness, is it permissible to break the marital bond without mutual consent.



…. a guest ….. asked him, “Which do you consider the most spiritual place in America?” “I have always considered Los Angeles the Benaras of America,” the Master replied.



He taught me an ancient yoga technique of concentration, and added some general counsel.

“When you aren’t practicing this concentration technique, try to keep your mind focused at the point between the eyebrows. This is called the Christ center, because when Christ consciousness is attained one’s awareness becomes centered here.”

“Would it help,” I asked, “to keep my mind focused there all day long as well?”

“Very much! …….”

“And another thing,” Bernard added, “this is also the seat of the spiritual eye. The more deeply you concentrate your gaze at this point, the more you’ll become aware of a round light forming there: a blue field with a bright, golden ring around it and a silvery white five-pointed star in the center.”



“Never say that you are a sinner,” he went on to advise us. “You are a child of God! Gold, though covered for centuries with mud, remains gold. Even so, the pure gold of the soul, though covered for eons of time with the mud of delusion, remains pure ‘gold’ forever. To call yourself a sinner is to identify yourself with your sins instead of trying to rid yourself of them. It is to affirm sinfulness. To call yourself a sinner is the greatest sin before God!”



“Visualize the Guru,” he said, “at the point between the eyebrows, the Christ center. This is the ‘broadcasting station’ in the body. Call to him deeply at this point. Then try to feel his response in your heart, which is the body’s ‘receiving set.’ When that response comes, it will be here that you feel it intuitively. When it comes, pray deeply, ‘Introduce me to God.’”



As buildings and place develop vibrations according to the consciousness of the people who frequent them, so music also develops vibrations beyond those of the actual sound.



Renunciation is no abject self-deprivation, but a glorious affirmation of the universe of joy that is our birthright.

As St.John of the Cross put it:
In order to arrive at having pleasure in everything,
Desire pleasure in nothing.
In order to arrive at possessing everything,
Desire to possess nothing.
In order to arrive at being everything,
Desire to be nothing.
In order to arrive at the knowledge of everything,
Desire to know nothing.



“When this ‘I’ shall die,” Master once wrote…… “then shall I know who am I.”



Sometimes he intrigued us with references, always casual, to the past lives of certain well-known public figures. “Winston Churchill,” he told us, “was Napoleon. Napoleon wanted to conquer England. Churchill, as England’s Prime Minister, has fulfilled that ambition. Napoleon wanted to destroy England. As Churchill he has had to preside over the disintegration of the British Empire. …….” “Hitler …… was Alexander the Great.”……… Mussolini, Master said, was Mark Antony. Kaiser Wilhelm was Julius Caeser. Stalin was Genghis Khan…….Abraham Lincoln…… had been a yogi in the Himalayas ……. He [Abraham Lincoln] has come again in this century …… as Charles Lindbergh …….. Therese Neumann, the Catholic stigmatist …… was Mary Magdalene ……… Lahiri Mahasaya …. in a previous life was King Janaka …….. According to another disciple, Master told someone that Lahiri Mahasaya had also been the great medieval mystic Kabir. …. “Babaji…… is an incarnation of India’s greatest prophet, Krishna.”

Master then revealed to us that he himself had been Krishna’s closest friend and disciple, Arjuna.



And as Paramahansa Yogananda often said - …….. “A saint is a sinner who never gave up.”



I was intrigued to learn ….. that advanced yogis sometimes incarnate in several bodies at once, in order the more quickly to work out their past karmas.



…… The body is immobile in this trance state; one’s absorption in God, at this point, is called sabikalpa samadhi, or qualified absorption, a condition still subject to change, for on one’s return from this lower samadhi one assumes once again the limitations of ego. …… the supreme state: nirbikalpa samadhi, or unqualified absorption – a condition changeless and eternal. If from this state one returns to body-consciousness, he does so no longer with the consciousness of being separate or different from the ocean of Spirit. John Smith no longer exists. It is the eternal Spirit, now, which animates his body …….. This outward direction of energy on the part of one who has attained nirbikalpa samadhi is sometimes known also as sahaja, or effortless, samadhi.

Divine freedom comes only with the attainment of nirbikalpa samadhi. Until that stage, the ego can still – and alas, sometimes does – draw the mind back down into delusion again. Only with nirbikalpa samadhi does one become what is known as a jivan mukta, free even though living in a physical body.

A jivan mukta, however, unimaginably high though his sate is, is not yet fully emancipated. The thought, “I am John Smith,” has been destroyed. He can acquire no new karma, since the post of ego to which his karma was tied has been destroyed forever. There remains even no, however, the memory of all those prior existences …… All those old selves must be made over, their karma spiritualized and released into the Infinite.

“Very few saints on earth have achieved final liberation, becoming siddhas, or perfected beings,” Master told me one day.



“It is only the thought that we are not free that keeps us from actually being free. Merely to break that thought would suffice to put us into samadhi! Samadhi is not something we have to acquire. We have it already!”



When the soul attains final liberation, it becomes a siddha (“perfected being”), or param mukta (“supremely free soul”). Even in this state, individuality is not lost, but is retained in the memory of omniscience. The karma of John Smith’s many incarnations has been released into the Infinite, but the memory of all those lifetimes, now spiritualized, remains an eternal reality in divine memory. The soul, however, once it attains this state of supreme liberation, rarely reactivates it's remembered individuality, and never does so except at the command of the Divine Will.’ When such a supremely free soul returns to this world it comes only for the sake of humanity. Such an incarnation is called an avatar, or “divine incarnation.”

Such, Master told us, was Babaji, the first of our direct line of gurus. Such also were Lahiri Mahasaya …….. and Swami Sri Yukteswar ……..

“Sir,” I asked Master one day …… “are you an avatar?”

With quiet simplicity he replied, “A work of this importance would have to have been started by such a one.”

An avatar, he told us, descends to worldly birth with a divine mission, often for the general upliftment of mankind as well as the particular salvation of a few disciples. ……. To avatars He gives the power to bring vast numbers of souls to freedom in God. Siddhas as given power only to liberate themselves and a few others.



“If you want God,” Master used to say, “go after Him. It takes great determination and steadfast, deep effort. And remember, the minutes are more important than the years.”

A great aid on the path, however, is the constant thought, “I am free already!”



Oliver Wendell Holmes said, “To have doubted one’s own first principles is the mark of a civilized man.”



Jesus’ own words, “Whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it”



We need not so much destroy our desires as rechannel their energies Godward.



Until a desire has been either fulfilled in action or dissipated by wisdom, it may remain dormant in the subconscious, like a seed, for incarnations.



Likes, dislikes, and their resultant attractions and aversions, all of which induce desires and repulsions, are the root cause of our bondage. The progressive stages of involvement with maya may be traced through the progressive functions of human consciousness: mon, buddhi, ahankara, and chitta: mind, intellect, ego, and feeling

Paramahansa Yogananda illustrated these basic functions by a horse, seen in a mirror. The mirror is the mind (mon), which shows us the image as it appears to us through the senses; the mind alone, however, cannot qualify or define that image.

Buddhi (intellect) then defines what is seen, informing our consciousness, “That is a horse.”

Ahankara (ego) then appears, declaring, “This is my horse.” Up to this point we are not necessarily yet bound by the thought of ownership, the identification, though personal, may still remain more or less abstract.

If, then, chitta (feeling) comes onto the scene, saying, “How happy I am to see my horse!” true ego-bondage begins. Chitta is our emotional reaction, including likes and dislikes, desires and aversions. It is the true source of ego-bondage, and the essence of all delusion.

Thus, the ancient classical exponent of the yoga science, Patanjali, defined yoga itself as “the neutralization of the vortices (vrittis) of chitta.” ……. Yogas chitta vritti nirodh. ….. “Vritti,” moreover, doesn’t mean “fluctuation,” or “waves,” as is often translated, but “whirlpool,” which more graphically describes drawing feelings inward to a center in the ego.



When travelling ……. Generally he [Yogananda] ate in the car, to avoid what he termed the “heterogeneous vibrations” of restaurants.



“I know every thought you think,” he once assured me calmly.



He [Yogananda] told us more than once that in a former life he had been William the Conqueror ……… Master said he had also been a leader in Spain, whose mission had been to drive the Moors out of that country ……. He didn’t tell us who that person was, however.



“Will power,” Master told us, “is more important to success than knowledge, training, or even native ability.”



Master was talking to us ……. “One evening I had just returned to Mt. Washington when a sudden, violent wind struck the main building. It was an effect from the evil karma of the World War II. People little realize how greatly the very elements are affected by mass consciousness.”



“Do souls that have been born on this earth keep reincarnating here?” Master’s reply, ……. was, “No, there are innumerable planets to go to.”



His next life on earth, Master told us, would be spent in the Himalayas. Having devoted so much of his present life to public service, he planned to remain for many years of that incarnation in deep seclusion. …… Two hundred years would elapse, he told us, before his next incarnation.



“Don’t sleep a great deal. Sleep is the unconscious way of contacting God. Meditation is a state beyond sleep – superconsciousness, as opposed to subconsciousness. ….



“ ……If you read one hour, then write two hours, think three hours, and meditate all the time.’

From ‘Ramana Smrti. A Birth centenary offering - 1980’ - Sri Ramanasramam, Tiruvannamalai

The method is simply this: you ask yourself, “Who am I?” and try to keep your whole mind concentrated on getting an answer to that question. True, various thoughts will arise unbidden within you and assault you and try to divert your attention. For all these thoughts, however, the ‘I’ thought is the source and sustenance. So, as each thought arises, without allowing it to go on developing itself, ask who gets this thought. The answer will be ‘I’. Then ask yourself: “Who is this ‘I’ and whence?” The Maharshi says, “….. Follow the above method with faith and hope and you will surely succeed.” …… A keen effort of the mind, complete introversion of all the faculties, total absorption in the quest wherefrom the ‘I’ springs – all this is needed for success.



The Bible (Verse 2 of Chapter 10, Ecclesiastics) says, “A wise man’s heart is at his right hand, but a fool’s heart is at his left.” The Maharshi also quotes the Yoga Vasishta which says that the heart on the right side is the one to take note of, that this heart is……… the basis and source of all.



…… his main teaching, “Either know who you are or surrender.”



…… in the Gita: The knowers of the Self look with an equal eye on a Brahmana endowed with learning and humility, a cow, an elephant, a dog and an outcast.



….his words…… “All religions and spiritual practices have no other purpose than getting the mind under control…. In devotion, your mind is merged in the God you love and ceases to exist as separate from Him. He guides your mind step by step and no control is needed ……. Meditate on God or on some mental or material image of Him. This will slow down your mind and it will get controlled on it's own accord”



He also believed that fine grinding and careful cooking would make any food easily digestible. So we used to spend hours on grinding and stewing.



…….. Bhagavan told me that the deer had died. I said: “Some great soul came to you as a deer to gain liberation from your hands.” Bhagavan said: “Yes, it must be so. When I was on the hill, a crow used to keep me company. He was a rishi in a crow’s body…… ” Once a garuda, a white breasted eagle, which is considered holy in India, flew into the hall and sat on the top of a cupboard near Bhagavan. ……. “He is a siddha (a saint endowed with supernatural powers) who came to pay me a visit,” said Bhagavan most seriously.

The respect he showed to animals and birds was most striking. He really treated them as equals. They were served food first like some respected visitors, and if they happened to die in the Ashram, they would be given a decent burial and a memorial stone.



“…… You need not torture the body. ……just keep the body going so that it does not become a hindrance. For this, pure and fresh food, simply prepared and taken in moderation, is a great help.



…….Arunachala. Bhagavan declared it to be the spiritual axis of the earth and requested that it's other pole be sought on a map. This appeared to be in the sea off Peru, the west coast of South America. However, modern plate tectonics suggest that India was originally much further south, in the presumed location of Lemuria, which would place the opposite pole in California, a recognized spiritual center.



“It is not by action but by renunciation of action that one attains Liberation.”



Sri Bhagavan showed reverence for life …… “You may call a tree a standing man, and a man a walking tree.”

From ‘Sri Ramana Reminiscences’ by G. V. Subbaramayya

Sri Bhagavan explained how we have a glimpse of the real Self every day. Between sleep and waking there is a momentary twilight. The waking-consciousness begins with the I-thought. Just before the upsurge of the I-thought, there is a split second of undifferentiated, pure consciousness, then the I-thought with which the world-consciousness floods in, this is the order. The middle state is Self-awareness. We can sense it if we are sufficiently alert and watchful.



Sri Bhagavan ……. Said, “Ten times’ attentive reading is writing. Hundred times’ writing is translating.”



“Bhagavan, people scoff at me, calling me a ‘superstitious idolator.’” Sri Bhagavan told him, “Why don’t you retort by calling them worse idolators? For do they not wash, dress, embellish, feed and thus ‘worship’ their body so many times every day. Is not the body the biggest idol? Then who is not an idol worshipper?”



Sri Bhagavan quoted ….. : “Where psychology ends, philosophy begins” and added His own remark, “Where philosophy ends spirituality begins.”



Sri Bhagavan …….. His replies ……… Even with the limited knowledge of our present life, we are so much oppressed as to be unable to shake off the ego. If we should get to know of our past lives also, the difficulty would be all the greater because the ego would then be much more strengthened. So it is better not to worry about knowing the past, the future or even the present.



Sri Bhagavan also remarked that there might be exceptional cases of even animals and plants attaining Self-Realization



Referring to Mouna (Silence), Sri Bhagavan said, “Silence is of four kids: Silence of speech, Silence of the eye, Silence of the ear, and Silence of the mind. Only the last is pure Silence and is the most important.”



Sri Bhagavan remarked: ‘That which is not real (the body) you take as real and anguish is the only result.’



Sri Bhagavan …… explaining a verse in Upadesa Saram said:

“Breath-control can only produce Manolayam, i.e. temporary suspension of the mind. One-pointed meditation and concentration alone can lead to Manonasam, i.e. destruction of the mind.”



Sri Bhagavan cited a sloka ……. “In indigestion water acts as medicine; when there is no indigestion, water serves as tonic. Water at the end of the meal serves as Nectar; but water at the beginning of a meal acts as poison.” ……. Sri Bhagavan recollected a sloka ……. “Buttermilk mixed with cardamom, ginger, lemon-juice and a little salt is of rare relish …..” Sri Bhagavan Himself liked thin buttermilk prepared in the above way.

From ‘the humble administrator's garden’ by Vikram Seth

From the Babur-Nama: Memoirs of Babur, First Moghul Emperor of India

………
Hindustan is a land of meager pleasures.
The people are not handsome, nor have they
The least conception of the charms of friendship.
They have not spirit, no comprehension, kindness
Or fellow-feeling – no inventiveness
In handicraft or skill in design – no method,
Order, principle, rule in work or thought;
No good flesh or bread in their bazaars,
No ice, cold water, musk-melons, grapes; no horses;
No aqueducts or canals in palace or garden,
Not a single bath or college in the whole land,
No candles, no torches; not even a candlestick.



Love and Work

The fact is, this work is as dreary as shit.
I do not like it a bit.
While at it I wander off into a dream
When I return, I scream.

If I had a lover
I’d bear it all, because when day is over
I could go home and find peace in bed.
Instead

The boredom pulps my brain
And there is nothing at day’s end to help assuage the pain.
I am alone, as I have usually been.
The lawn is green.

The robin hops into the sprinkler’s spray.
Day after day
I fill the feeder with bird-seed,
My one good deed.

Night after night
I turn off the porch light, the kitchen light.
The weight lodged in my spirit will not go
For years, I know.

There is so much to do
There isn’t any time for feeling blue.
There isn’t any point in feeling sad.
Things could be worse. Right now they’re only bad.

From ‘As It Is. Dialogues on the open Secret’ by Tony Parsons

Consciousness simply is. It is energy manifesting without any interest in any of the concepts that our minds have about good or bad, purpose or meaning. It is absolutely impersonal and has no particular direction. It is playing the game of creation and destruction.



But if there’s nowhere to go, there is no purpose, it seems, in anything?

And this realization is the beginning of liberation. We are so locked into the belief that our lives have some sort of purpose we have to fulfil. We go on struggling to fulfil some idea we have of something we need to do, or somewhere that we need to get to, in order to be worthy.



The ego tends to diminish in effect as the gaze of presence evaporates it's illusory identity. Usually the ego demands full attention, like a child, and when it's simply gazed upon without any interest, it tends to dry up and die.



Simply give up your attachment and fascination with the story and let life happen. Something else of immense significance will take the place of all your worries and you will be overrun by a new sense of wonder. Everything will reflect a quality of benevolence. This is the natural way for life to be.



Begin to allow the watcher to emerge. See that the mind is always trying to run the show, to strut the stage. Just see this without judgement, and that seeing emanates from silence.



……My first really deep understanding, which came from reading, was an interpretation of Christ’s words in the book ‘The New Man’ by Maurice Nicholl. He explained that the word “repent” did not mean “to show sorrow for your sins and vow never to sin again”. The word in Christ’s native local tongue meant “to turn 180 degrees and see anew”. This was for me a revelation that went deeper than just intellectual understanding.



Give up the search for something to happen and fall in love, fall intimately in love with the gift of presence in what is. Here, right here, is the seat of all that you will ever long for. It is simple and ordinary, and magnificent. You see, you are already home.

From ‘Moments Remembered. Reminiscences of Bhagavan Ramana’ by V. Ganesan

In the course of tracing ourselves back to our source, when all thoughts have vanished, there arises a throb from the Hridaya on the right, manifesting as ‘Aham’ ‘Aham’ ‘I-I’. This is the sign that Pure Consciousness is beginning to reveal itself. But that is not the end in itself. Watch wherefrom this sphurana (throbbing) arises and wait attentively and continually for the revelation of the Self. Then comes the awareness, oneness of existence.
When we steady our breath we feel the steadying of our thoughts. Then the thoughts turn inward and melt away at a point. Watching this point, where the thoughts vanish, will also help us to merge ourselves in the Hridaya.



Bhagavan on Arunachala …… “…… Is it just a hill of rocks? ….. Arunachala is the Self Itself ….. Of al the saints who adored Arunachala in many hymns, the child-saint Jnanasambandar’s songs are remarkable ……. He saw the Holy Hill as …… the ‘manifestation of Knowledge (Jnana) inundation’. It is the best and exact description of this Wisdom Mountain!”



Bhagavan observed a small child eating lots of sugar …… “Give a few teaspoons of ghee to the child. Ghee is the antidote for too much sugar!”



Professor Aiyar said: ………. “ …….. One noticed in Bhagavan’s daily life, personal cleanliness, tidiness of dress, habitual wearing of vibhuti and kumkum on the forehead; equal sharing of all enjoyments with those around one; strict adherence to a time schedule; doing useful work however ‘low’ it be; never leaving a work unfinished; the pursuit of perfection in every action; incessant activity except while sleeping or resting after a spell of hard work; never considering oneself superior to others; speaking the truth always, or strict silence if the expression of a truth would hurt or lower the reputation of others; perfect self-help, never asking another to do a piece of work which can be done by oneself; taking full responsibility for failure; if any, without shifting the blame on others; accepting success and failure with equanimity; never disturbing the peace of another; leaving the leaf or plate clean after eating; complete non-interference in the affairs of others; never worrying about the future.



….. some bee-wax ……. mixed it with cotton and made ear-plug …… totally sound-proof …….such ear-plugs …… a boon for undisturbed meditation.



Some of Bhagavan’s personal instructions to me:

(i) If you observe the breathing one-pointedly such attention will lead you spontaneously into kumbhaka (retention) – this is jnana pranayama.

(ii) The more you humble yourself, the better it is for you, in all ways. ………..

(vii) Both likes and dislikes should be equally discarded and eschewed.

(viii) With attention focused on the first person and on the heart within, one should relentlessly practice Who am I? When this is done one-pointedly, one’s breathing will subside of itself. During such controlled practice, the mind might suddenly spring up; so you have to vigilantly pursue the vichara, Who am I?