1/17/2025

Practicing the Sri Ramana

Teaching’s of
Ramana Maharshi Maharshi
VEV732: Special Module On Inner
Development-II
Practicing the Teachings of Ramana
Maharshi

Lecture 2

Jan 15, 2025

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Sri Ramana Maharshi

Ramana Maharshi, a 20th century South Indian sage continues to
radiate peace and Self-awareness to the global community of
Arunachala spiritual seekers. We do not need to join any organization, adopt any
belief system, or worship anyone or anything to experience this
transmission of bliss and clarity. Practicing his teachings simply
points you towards your innermost, pure and sublime Self, the
unchanging reality underlying all that exists. It is as if our life and the
world is a movie; Maharishi’s practice of asking Who Am I?, allows
us to find real happiness through the realization that you are that
unchanging, blemish less screen on to which the world is projected
like a movie.

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Sri Ramana Maharshi Sri Ramana Maharshi

"It was about six weeks before I left Madurai for good that the great "The shock of the fear of death drove my mind inwards and I said to
change in my life took place. It was quite sudden. I was sitting alone myself mentally, without actually framing the words: 'Now death has
in a room on the first floor of my uncle's house. I seldom had any come; what does it mean? What is it that is dying? This body dies.'
sickness, and on that day, there was nothing wrong with my health, And I at once dramatized the occurrence of death. I lay with my
but a sudden violent fear of death overtook me. There was nothing in limbs stretched out stiff as though rigor mortis had set in and
my state of health to account for it, and I did not try to account for it imitated a corpse so as to give greater reality to the enquiry. I held
or to find out whether there was any reason for the fear. I just felt ‘I my breath and kept my lips tightly closed so that no sound could
am going to die’ and began thinking what to do about it. It did not escape, so that neither the word 'I' nor any other word could be
occur to me to consult a doctor or my elders or friends; I felt that I uttered. 'Well then,' I said to myself, ‘this body is dead. It will be
had to solve the problem myself, there and then. carried stiff to the burning ground and there burnt and reduced to
ashes.

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Sri Ramana Maharshi Sri Ramana Maharshi

But with the death of this body am I dead? Is the body ‘I? It is silent Absorption in the Self continued unbroken from that time on. Other
and inert, but I feel the full force of my personality and even the thoughts might come and go like the various notes of music, but the
voice of the 'I' within me, apart from it. So, I am Spirit transcending ‘I' continued like the fundamental sruti note that underlies and
the body. The body dies but the Spirit that transcends it cannot be blends with all the other notes. Whether the body was engaged in
touched by death. That means I am the deathless Spirit.’ All this was talking, reading or anything else, I was still centered on ‘I’.
not dull thought; it flashed through me vividly as living truth which I
Previous to that crisis I had no clear perception of my Self and was
perceived directly, almost without thought-process. I was
not consciously attracted to it. I felt no perceptible or direct interest
something very real, the only real thing about my present state, and
in it, much less any inclination to dwell permanently in it."
all the conscious activity connected with my body was centered on
that I. From that moment onwards the I or Self focused attention on
itself by a powerful fascination. Fear of death had vanished once
and for all.

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Sri Ramana Maharshi Sri Ramana Maharshi

What exactly is this Self of which you speak? If what you say is true You ask me to describe this true Self to you.
there must be another self in man. What can be said? It is That out of which the sense of the personal ‘I' arises and
into which it will have to disappear.
SRI RAMANA: Can a man be possessed of two identities, two
selves? To understand this matter it is first necessary for a man to PB: Disappear? How can one lose the feeling of one's personality?
analyze himself. Because it has long been his habit to think as SRM: The first and foremost of all thoughts, the primeval thought in the mind of
others think, he has never faced his ‘I’ in the true manner. He has not every man, is the thought ‘I’. It is only after the birth of this thought that any
a correct picture of himself; he has too long identified himself with other thoughts can arise at all. It is only after the first personal pronoun, ‘I’ has
the body and the brain. Therefore, I tell you to pursue this enquiry, arisen in the mind that the second personal pronoun, 'you', can make its
appearance. If you could mentally follow the ‘I' thread until it led you back to its
'Who am I?' source you would discover that, just as it is the first thought to appear, so it is
the last to disappear. This is a matter which can be experienced.

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Sri Ramana Maharshi Sri Ramana Maharshi

PB: You mean that it is possible to conduct such a mental PB: But surely the sense of T' must also pertain to that?
investigation into oneself?
The sense of 'T' pertains to the person, the body and brain. When a
SRM: Certainly. It is possible to go inwards until the last thought, ‘I’, man knows his true Self for the first time something else arises from
gradually vanishes. the depths of his being and takes possession of him.
PB: What is then left? Will a man then become quite unconscious, That something is behind the mind; it is infinite, divine, eternal.
or will he become an idiot? Some people call it the Kingdom of Heaven, others call it the soul
and others again Nirvana, and Hindus call it Liberation; you may give
SRM: No; on the contrary, he will attain that consciousness which is
it what name you wish. When this happens a man has not really lost
immortal, and he will become truly wise when he has awakened to
himself; rather he has found himself.
his true Self, which is the real nature of man.

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