Tat Tvam Asi - That Thou Art - Swami Sarvapriyananda

[Music] lead us from the unreal to the real lead us from darkness unto light lead us from death to immortality home peace peace peace namaste everybody and welcome back to another session of meditation and philosophy today we are on home ground at least it's my home ground and also home ground for most of us because we're going to speak about vedanta i had mentioned just to put it out there that when i talked about buddhist meditation it's something that it is i'm not initiated into it nor am i authorized to teach it it's something that i have studied and uh academically and also practiced a little bit myself that's why i was teaching but it's good to be clear there i also made it clear that the kashmir sheikh is a tradition though it's part of the hindu tradition i still not i'm not initiated into and there you really have to be initiated into those traditions to teach it i have i have and i am only studying it academically under some very good teachers um and also have practiced a little bit of it myself and that's what i shared but the devotional tradition we talked about last time that's very much part of our tradition and now we have come to the core of our own my own tradition our own tradition which is vedanta or advaita vedanta so yes i am authorized to teach i am initiated i am a monk of vedanta and authorized initiated to practice and teach all right so that's good so what is vedanta most of us already know this but it's good to start by highlighting that upanishad vedanta is the source of spiritual knowledge called the upanishads upanishads we know are these texts spiritual philosophical texts which are found in the vedas which are the most ancient and most fundamental religious texts of the hindus perhaps the most ancient available record of spirituality which is available to humanity at large so in the upanishads we find what might be called the final teachings the highest teachings of the vedas so in that sense anta when you say veda anta the end of the vedas literally does not mean the end of the vedas because sometimes the upanishads are found scattered in between the vedic corpus it means anta in the sense of the the final the highest the conclusion in sanskrit siddhanta the final conclusion the conclusive teachings of the vedas and based on the upanishads so upanishads basically the textual basis of vedanta is the upanishads if you say what are the texts what are you talking about we're talking about upanishads but based on that there is the bhagavad gita which is the essence of the upanishadic teaching and in put in the form of a very practical spirituality taught by krishna to arjuna gita does not claim to be anything original apart from the upanishadic teaching and she krishna is cognizant of that often he actually quotes directly from the upanishads so the bhagavad gita is part of the basic set of texts of vedanta and then you have another text called the brahmasutras so all systems of orthodox philosophy have a set of sutras which are effortistic statements uh very short cryptic sanskrit uh sentences the set of the sutras it systematizes the entire knowledge it's like a compressed a compressed zip file you know in a computer zip file you have a lot of information which is packed in the sutras are like that you have a whole system of philosophy of spiritual knowledge packed into a few short sentences so you have the yoga sutras for example patanjali's yoga you have much more complex than all of these sutras you had the panini's grammar sanskrit grammar is based on a set of large set of sutras but similarly you have the vedanta sutras brahma sutras brahma sutras and vedanta sutras are the same thing they they take up the teachings of the upanishads and they reflect they rethink and they try to systematize but because they are sutras they are cryptic and so they are open to interpretation and they have been interpreted in fact they are in many ways open-ended so they allow for multiple interpretations and they have been interpreted in different ways and these interpretations of the brahma sutras which are based on the upanishads these interpretations of the brahma sutras are foundational for the various schools of vedanta so vidant is not just one school there are multiple schools of vedanta multiple darshanas or philosophies which have come out of the upanishads advaita vedanta is based on shankaracharya's commentary on the vedanta sutras vishishta dwaita vedanta the qualified monism of ramanuja is based on ramanuja's commentary on the brahmasutras dwight of the dualistic vedanta is based on commentary on the brahmasutras and you have shuddhadvaita vedanta of balabhacharya you have the dwayta dwaytavedanth of nimbarkacharya you have the achintia bhedaveda which is the philosophical basis of you know in the united states people are very familiar the iscon the hare krishna people so they have their philosophical basis in one school of vedanta called the what we're going to talk about here is advaita vedanta so i'm zooming in i've given you the big picture now i'm zooming into the specifics of what we're going to do today next time and the time after that advaita vedanta which is one school of vedanta but quite distinct as we shall see pretty unique in the whole spectrum of religion and philosophy and spirituality advaita vedanta is pretty unique all the other schools of vedanta they are basically dualistic and devotional brahmanujas vishishta dwighta madhvas dwighta vedanta they are all about god and devotion and worship and faith beautiful systems but they are basically therefore they are all theologies they are uh reasoning based on certain assumptions about god and and presuming faith advice is very different it is pretty unique that way so we're going to talk about advaita vedanta one advantage of advaita vedante is what it teaches can be said pretty simply that's the title of today's talk you might have seen tatwa masih that thou art so this is from the chando gyo panisha one of the upanishads in which the teacher who's the father tells the student who is his actually son that thou art talks about the ultimate reality of the universe and then finally tells the student tells his son you are that reality tattoo that means that it's pretty close to the english that tuam means thou you you my son you the individual being and that the cosmic reality you're actually one in the same reality and this is supposed to be realized and this will solve all our problems so there are these two points here all of these systems i'm not just talking about advaita vedanta now what we did in the last three classes in fact all of these philosophy especially the philosophies coming out of india they are all meant for realization they're all meant for self-realization as vivekananda said religion is realization it's not believing in something or giving your ascent to a doctrine um following a particular system or subscribing to you know i belong to this religion or this organization no it's about realization i remember swami pramishanandaji who was a disciple of the holy mother mashardha and in his own lifetime he was regarded as an enlightened person as a jivan mukta brahma gyani his attendant for the last more than 10 years of his life was swami suhita nandaji who is now the vice president of our order he was a young novice of brahmacari at that time of course a long time ago in 1960s and i had the good fortune to start my monastic life and my early training under swami suhitan energy so he used to tell me stories about swami pramishananda there was this other elderly gentleman in ashram when i joined the ashram many above 26 years ago a little gentleman very devoted person now it seems so he had um he he was not a monk formerly but he was very monk like i mean he never went into householder life he was a spiritual practitioner all his professional life after retirement from his job he stayed in the ashram i'm talking about badal babu now and so in his young days he used to go to swami premeshananda when swami suhitananda was a young brahmacharya at that time so this is this is the story about those days 1960 or so um so bad baba had this tendency you know this interest in yogis and you know spiritual seekers and and sadhus monks um tantrics and the practitioners of different kinds and he would go and visit them or read about them and then come and tell swami pramishananda about it you know swami i met this person who has been practicing medicine meditation in this way or i read about this yogi who lived in a cave and he had these experiences and so and so forth one day swami pramisha and they said to him with a touch of pathos you know a little bit of sorrow i'll tell you in english and for those who understand bengali i'll tell you the original bengali what he said was my dear boy his name was badal but which means cloud in english but uh affectionately he would call him badla so model but just like a sort of play on the word badla said my dear boy badla um look here if the whole world were to turn into ramakrishna not only the whole world becomes spiritual everybody becomes enlightened not only enlightened let everybody become an avatar and incarnation of god ultimately what is it to you or to me if we do not realize it in our own lives it's wonderful the world will be transformed and everybody will be extraordinary all that's really good but at the end of our lives what does it really matter you know what we have read or whom we have met or how wonderful they were so in bengali he said what is it to you or what is it to me the whole emphasis is on enlightenment we must realize it that's one reason why i i really really like this advaithic approach because of all the approaches is the most direct it is concerned solely with self-realization with enlightenment as soon as possible as fast as possible as directly and as powerfully as possible as simply as possible we'll see how so this is um one thing which i wanted to say that it is all about self-realization and the second thing i wanted to say was just like and remember it's not just advaita vedanta all the others kashmiri shaibism buddhism the devotional approach are all about self-realization they're all about god realization the other thing which i wanted to say was all of these approaches and especially the advaitic approach is about overcoming suffering and attainment of fulfillment in sanskrit complete cessation transcendence overcoming of suffering abusing the words very carefully transcendence of suffering transcendence of suffering does not mean an end to suffering the world will go on the body will go on kovid will come and go uh so that will not be ended by advaita vedanta so transcendence you are in the middle of it and yet you are not so that is that is what that is the goal and fulfillment lasting fulfillment deep lasting profound fulfillment so that's the goal of advaita vedanta and it's also the goal of all those other systems as well okay having said that advaita vedanta is very direct i mean i can go on singing praises of this system because i suppose i am a little bit wee bit biased about it so what does it say that thou art you are that these sentences which express the the central teaching of advaita vedanta which is the identity of the individual and the ultimate reality jiva brahma i am ident your identity you are one with the ultimate reality the sentences in the upanishads which state this these are called mahavakyas great pronouncements or great sentences for example that thou art me i am brahman means exactly the same thing the teacher tells you that and you are not supposed to say that then you can just keep going back and forth between you and the teacher you are supposed to realize i am that i'm brahmasmi another so um is from the braillar neck upanishad which is from the yajur veda the chandu-gyo panishad is from the sama veda and then there is ayam atma brahma this very self is brahma again it means the same thing this very self i am brahman so this very self is brahman this is from the mandu kyo panishad which is from the atharva upanishad and then there is pragyanam brahma this consciousness the awareness which you feel this is the ultimate reality uh this is from the itario upanishad which is from the rig veda so from each of these vedas one statement has been taken from one of those upanishads as a representative of mahabharata but the mahavakas are many in number such sentences are scattered across the vedas across the open ships and across the vedas in fact okay another way in which the central teaching of the advaita vedanta can be put off quoted is brahma satyam jagat brahman alone is real a world is an appearance and you are none other than that ultimate reality brahman as we go through the talk today i hope by the end of the talk i would like you to see that you know at least in our understanding we get what it means something so radical and stunning as saying that you are that ultimate reality you are the only reality of the world the world is an appearance what do these things even mean how can they solve all my problems how can they give me lasting fulfillment and peace so this is the promise at the end of today's talk we will know this for sure now if you do not you have questions definitely you're most welcome to ask questions what i'm trying to say is it is it is understandable it's not very difficult at all and it just the understanding of it which we can have in the matter of an hour and a half it can it is producing a productive of great peace great a great lightness of being you know it's a great great great relief just to hear this even in sanskrit there is a term shavada mangalam auspicious just to hear it swami vivekananda said the truth is a corrosive substance of infinite power hear it once even if you don't understand it even if you don't agree with it it will continue to work if not in this lifetime we let's hope in this lifetime i'm hoping for in this class but over time it will it will work and it will give it if it will have its way and you will get the result the result being overcoming suffering and attainment of peace all right big promise as we go into it what kind of journey are we undertaking i've said this on other occasions but you have to listen carefully what kind of journey are we undertaking what is this advaita vedanta and what is it not one way of understanding that vedanta is to understand what it is not to listen carefully one is this journey it's not a physical journey it's not a journey which is um some kind of physical astral journey from earth to heaven you go to vaikunt or the abode of vishnu or kailash or the abode of shiva or the christian or islamic heaven no we are not talking about going to a place it's not a journey from here to there it's not a journey through space it's not a journey from one place to another place from a not so good place to a much better place i'm not saying those things are not possible but it's not about that it's not a journey from one place to another because that reality we're talking about here that ultimate reality is not only there in whatever great place you can think about which also here equally here so there's no point of going from one place to another which part of the ocean will you go to to find water you see what a silly question swami wherever you are in the ocean there's water if it's ocean it's water so it's like that the ultimate reality is available right here it's available everywhere and it's available right here right here you don't have to go anywhere then it's not a journey in time journey in time means from now to then when the coming of the messiah or the coming of the next avatar and we had of this monk sriram krishna said he would come again and he had left some clues so the coming of the incarnation is a great great big event in spiritual life so we had a monk very great before my time jagadeshwaranji but i have read his books very scholarly and saintly among from what i've heard those who have met him but he got this b in his bonnet a holy bee in his bonnet about when is sri ramakrishna going to come next and so he pursued that till the end of his life we're coming up the incarnation coming up the messiah or after i go to after death then only i will be free then only i'll be free after death there are many many philosophies and theologies which believe that that owned perfection is possible after that how can you be perfect here how can you be how can you be fully you know transcend sorrow here in this miserable place in this body no vedanta says advaita vedanta says it's not a journey from now to then you know after death or after the coming of the incarnation after going after something will happen not after see after is a time word but the reality we are talking about is it transcends time it is timeless what is there then afterwards is also now it is all the time at what time will you find the ultimate reality at all times if it is available at all times and is available now it will it be available in a better form more distilled form now it is too short and then it will be a one-shot vaccine later on then no it is always equally good available right now right here right now it is also not a journey from one object to another it's something to be understood mostly in religion we're seeking an object though we don't use that language but you know it could be god it could be an experience a samadhi you know a burst of light or a beautiful mystical experience meeting god who is not me something else some other reality called god i love that story about ramana maharshi where somebody goes to ramana maharshi and say that your method of inquiry who am i i love that but i like that but i don't really uh it's not really my way i am devoted to narayana to the lord narayana is it all right and ramana mashi said yes oh it's all right yes it's all right then after death will i go to the abode of god to wakunta to the abode of narayana and brahman she said yes oh i'll go to my country yes and will i see narayana there did i see god after death in heaven brahma namashi said yes oh really i will see narayana yes and will narayana look at me will god see me namashi said yes yes will god speak to me yes oh narayana will speak to me yes yes and what will he say to me he said he will say find out who you are who am i you know find that out i so that story it is not a journey from one object to another from you to something else it may be god it may be incarnation it may be buddha ramakrishna jesus krishna rama um we're not talking about that it is not even a new kind of experience all extraordinary we are not denying that all those extraordinary beautiful mystical experiences are possible visions of gods and goddesses are possible but we are not talking about that at this point somebody may say well then i have lost interest because i am interested in that experience i want to see narayan all see god no you should not lose interest because what we're going to talk about is the very foundation of that experience it is there in this worldly experience we are having now it is there in the depths of meditation it is there in the heights of mystical experience also it is one experience it is it is the the essence of all experiences if you understand what we are going to talk about you will see no mystical experience no samadhi is higher than what we are going to talk about if you understand what we are going to talk about today you will see that no vision of gods or goddesses no mystical experience no samadhi you know is valuable in itself they are all meant to bring you to this this is the purpose of all those practices so it's not a journey in space it's not a journey in time it's not a journey from one thing to another thing even not even from one type of experience to another type of experience then what is it what kind of a spiritual journey is it it's a journey from ignorance to knowledge in sanskrit avidya to india from argyana to ghyana from not knowing not realizing to knowing and realizing that's the journey and that journey is accomplished by what we will do today what is it not advaita is a path of knowledge from ignorance to knowledge by which i mean i am speaking to people who are mature so you will not misunderstand it is a path of knowledge by which i mean it's not a path of bhakti devotion it is not a path of yoga meditation it is not a path of karma action immediately let me take it all back that karma yoga bhakti action devotion meditation all have their place yes indeed in advaita vedanta also they have their place they are essential but but i will be cheating you on if i do not distinguish what i'm going to talk about today from those paths those are the paths you have already seen the other three sessions buddhism is bar excellence a path of meditation yesterday the last class was a path of devotion and kashmiri shaivism is a is a very wonderful mix of mysticism and devotion uh meditation but this is different it's different it's not it's not yoga it's not karma it's not bhakti we must understand advaita in its own um in its own light and then we can integrate we can integrate it back and we will see what role other things have to play but we must understand it in its own glory and it is a glory it's an amazing thing all right i have sold it enough um oh i also said it's not a path of action this is something that shankaracharya goes to great extent to distinguish the reason is because he is distinguishing it from the purum imamsa the ritualistic portion of the vedas which is full of ritual action ritualistic action but action nevertheless chanting and meditations and actual physical rituals and he wants to distinguish the upanishads advaita vedanta from that so he says the atman which ultimate reality which we are going to talk about is not accomplished through action what can you do through action he says means attain something which is not attained you can attain to action you are you are here and you want to go to the next village you can take the village pathways and go there that's attaining something which is not yet attained but you can't do that to the atman because as we said it's everywhere where do you go which is always it is you what will you do to it's like saying um um so what will you do to attain yourself you're already yourself um similarly utpaddya it can't be produced the ultimate reality is not something that is to be produced you know and this sounds simplistic but you can see if you relate it to the history of philosophy the whole of hegelian evolution from the primeval absolute to the evolved final evolved state of the absolute so it is something to be evolved through through the process of dialectics and reaching an a state of excellence advaita vedanta says absolutely not that that's not what we're talking about it's not something to be produced like you produced grain in a field you don't you can't produce the absolute it is not something to be to be modified or changed wicardia like just like milk is modified into yogurt you can't modify the individual being into the ultimate reality it can't it's not possible unless you are already that ultimate reality you're not you're not talking about converting the human into the divine you can't convert if you're if your reality is actually human you you will remain human you will remain a creature you will not remember it's you are not god and then it's samskara trump's career means refinement improvement can we improve are we talking about improving ourselves becoming better people better beings until we become god-like not at all not at all what improvements will you make to into to say the image of a golden mouse to turn it into gold you can improve it you can melt it and change it and make it into a golden ganesha this is a reference to ganesha and ganesha has a mouse you know in the imagery so the mouse is a mouse and ganesha is god so to turn the mouse into god you would have to melt the mouse form and put it into a ganesha form all that you can do but if i ask you the golden mouse to what refinement you have to make into the mouse to make it gold nothing it is gold so the ultimate reality is there you don't have to refine yourself into that ultimate reality so karma karma can only do these things produce something attain something change something refine something none of these are applicable to the ultimate reality which you already are so karma is not involved here at all action change is not involved here okay i still haven't started but um i think we have got a solid foundation to build upon what is the process now what is the process of advaita vedanta every path is a process so in meditation you'll get taught how to sit how to breathe and how to visualize in devotion you're taught about god and the glories of god and how you can have faith and devotion in god in ritualistic worship you're taught something and so on so what is the process here the process here is hearing reflection and meditation the self is to be realized is to be seen how do you see the self the real self so you have to hear about it you have to reason upon it and you have to meditate upon it hearing literally does not mean only hearing it means systematically studying studying what all these texts are available that's why it's there you hear it again and again you here means you are taught it it's not just like hearing music you have to engage your all your faculties you have to like really put effort into trying to understand what is being taught the open issues are there the bhagavad-gita and brahma-sutras of course there but so many texts and so many masters today is not only the original sanskrit text but also in other languages now in english so many texts are there which give you this central teaching and there is a parochial bhuti there is a viveka there is you know vedanta so many many many texts but they all teach you the same thing that's the beauty of them in various different ways so you won't be bored uh in different ways the shravana must continue hearing this again and again being taught it listening to this nothing new not one thing will be new when i said that thou art at the end of this class also i'll just say the same thing that thou art but we'll understand it much more clearly we'll see what is meant so shavana systematically studying literally hearing but systematically studying and by the way before this a lot of preparation has to be gone through that's where the role of you know when i said action is not to be discarded karma is useful devotion is useful meditation is useful all those are useful as preliminaries as preparations to come to this stage of shrabana so those will go on it's not that you finish those first and then come to vedanta class no those will go on in our lives we will lead ethical lives we will have devotional practices we will uh meditate so altruistic ethical action in our lives devotion surrender to god and um regular practice of meditation and focus these are like a solid foundation for vedanta for vedanta shavana means hearing um it's a name in india i uh recently one of the the professor who's joined harvard a few months ago her name is shabana so a very vedantic name so once you go through shavana what do you get you get a clarity about what these texts are the specific purpose of shavana is to remove doubt about pramada samshaya that means doubts about the source of knowledge the text what is vedanta teaching me if you go through this shravana once twice twice you have no more doubt i know what it is teaching then what remains i know what the texts are telling me i know what the teachers are telling me but i have many doubts i don't get it then you go to the second stage again these go on parallelly today you'll have shravana you'll also have manana you have many questions about every aspect of spiritual life and especially about advaithic teachings so those questions which are doubts is it possible how is it that i am not a body how is it that i am not a person what is this nature of consciousness existence what you're talking about is there at all such a thing aren't they abstractions all these questions and details you know like every minute detail you can examine your ask you're supposed to understand see here is something interesting let me put it this way devotion is accomplished through the heart by heart i mean desire and love and passion all our love passion desire for the world is collected and poured to god in faith and adoration that's how bhakti works that's how devotion works it works it's based on the heart i mean i'm not saying that there won't be action there won't be thinking there won't be other things but but mainly it's based on the heart it depends on generalization sublimation of your of your emotions meditation it's based on the mind all other things are there the body has to be stable the desires have to be quietened but it's the mind which has to focus the mind which is a series of thoughts about scattered things it has to be brought under focus into awareness into calmness so meditation is mind based devotion is heart based karma where the ritualistic karma or actually action in the world is will based is based on the will i will use my body mind to do this so that is action vedanta advaita vedanta is based on the understanding intellect buddhi it is our understanding the faculty the highest faculty that we have our entire world view our entire understanding of what's going on here that has to be changed so to understanding means you need to ask questions so the second thing which is asking questions and having clarity you must think if you cannot love you cannot be a devotee if you cannot work for the welfare of others you can't be a karma yogi if you can't focus sit down and focus you can't be a meditator if you can't reason if you if you refuse to think advaita vedanta won't work for you you must think so um it is the way of the philosopher and again i'm careful philosopher i don't mean you have to sign up for a philosophy course often that's more harmful than useful or not that you have to read all philosophy books but philosophy means in the sense of thinking um and then meditation so after this stage of manana what have you got you have got i now know i i not only know what the texts are telling me i understand it it's clear to me i am convinced first one i know the teaching but i don't understand it i'm not clear about it i'm not convinced about it after reasoning i know the teaching now i'm clear about it i'm convinced i'm sold i got it but then what's the problem now one more problem remains that's still not a living thing for me i still feel more or less the same and the promise was i'll go beyond suffering i will attain fulfillment that's not quite i'm not quite there i get it now what you are pointing me towards but it's not a full-blown reality in my life yet the promises have not been fulfilled so for that what you have learned what you are now you have understood what you have got clarity upon you bear down on that you settle down you you soak it in in meditative processes intensely sit with what you have got understood the clarity the conviction those are meditative processes those we will see in next session and the session after that so you can see the meditative process is called needed hassan they are advaithic non-dual meditation specialized meditation techniques they will work only if you understand and you will understand only if you listen so shavana manana needed asana you can't in vedanta you cannot jump to the meditation in buddhism you can jump to the meditation but in vedanta you can't jump to the meditation you have to understand it's like you think deeply about what you learned in class oh so thinking deeply is important i will not go to class but then what do you think deeply about all right still haven't started now we know shavana mananananandhyasana that this is the core practice all other practices are there we are not denying the role of karma yoga bhakti yoga and and raja about yoga or meditation they're all supporting but the core practice is guyana yoga what is ghana yoga shavana manana nilithyasana systematically studying vedanta reasoning it through till you get conviction and clarity and finally meditating upon your your absolute clarity and conviction till it becomes a living reality for you which swami vivekananda called assimilating this knowledge he says till it tingles with every drop of your blood i am that so i am he i am that okay now the core of advaita vedanta itself the teaching um i will go through very fast but then we will keep coming back to it it is this we do not know what we are we we think the moment we are asked what we are we don't we don't think about it but if you are asked our first reaction is oh i am this thing here what do you mean by this thing body well yes body and um the mind body mind i guess that's it the person this person i am this person i'm swami sarva pyananda who else would i be this instinctive identification with the body mind are you all these things around you no no no absolutely not there are other things are you all these people of course not they are others they are people i am i am the subject these are all object i am a person they are all persons and there are living beings and there are non-living things this world view about myself and the world this advaita vedanta says is dramatically mistaken and this is the this is the cause of all our problems luckily the good news is it can be corrected pretty i won't say easy well yes let me say easily it can be corrected pretty easily the insight the breakthrough it's a pretty flimsy layer of a veil of illusion which separates us from the truth about ourselves as vivekananda used to say if only you knew if you if only you knew what you truly are if only you knew the truth about yourselves so what is that truth about ourselves that we have to see advaita vedante insist that thou art brahman it basically says you are this unlimited awareness immortal awareness right now and you can discover it and you can stabilize yourself in that awareness and you can live like that and that solves your problems how do you do that very quickly i have mentioned these methods and you will see in many of my talks and in many of the books these methods are scattered but quickly um three ways any one of which we'll do we will see these ways uh next time in the time after that one way is the panchakosha another way is the avast paja kosha five sheets of the human personality another one is the avastatrya the three states of uh of our waking dreaming deep sleep a more basic way is drigrisha subject object knower and known seer and seen and these have talked about extensively what is done is for example i'll quickly lead you through all three and you will see they all lead to the same thing um take so now when i talk about it you'll have to do three things corresponding to hearing reasoning and meditation first corresponding to hearing is what did he say that's one and after yeah i know what he said the second thing will be do i get it is it clear to me i do i understand it what he's saying if not i can always ask later on and the third thing will be important is it a fact let me check advaita vedanta has this beauty about it that you can actually always check nothing nothing in advaita vedanta almost nothing in advaita vedanta is a matter of speculation faith or belief the insistence is it's always directly available to us right now so you can always check and ask yourself is it a fact if it is not a fact advice insist it it has to be a fact if you feel it's not a fact it still sounds speculative still sounds theoretical ask why where am i getting stuck you examine it yourself and ask the teacher it will take a little bit of time maybe but you'll get you'll make a breakthrough so let's take the first method i'll go through the three basic methods one is the method of the seer and the scene um you are looking at the screen looking at me in the screen now the screen is the object and the eyes are the the screen is the scene the eyes are the seer the eyes are seeing the screen said okay attend not to the screen but attend to the eyes attend means draw your attention become more aware of your eyes than the object which they are seeing yeah the scree do you know the screen you can see many things you can see many things same eye pair of eyes sees many things here is one seen are many the same pair of eyes not changing particularly they can see lot of changes from the morning till now so many things have changed which you have been seeing the scene keep changing the seer does not change and the seer most importantly the seer and the scene are different what you are seeing on the screen is physically different from your eyes in fact the only thing that the eyes cannot see are the eyes themselves to see something with the eyes you they have to be physically different and of course visible large enough and clear enough to be visible to the eyes they must be physically different the seer and the scene are different three things the seer is one the scene are many the seer is unchanging scene are changing and the seer is um and the seer in the scene are different in a very naive simple way don't be too philosophical about it moving on you're not aware of the eyes notice the eyes themselves you are aware of what's aware of the eyes the mind is aware of the eyes my eyes are open my eyes are closed i need glasses all these things about my eyes who knows the mind knows these are thoughts about my eyes so the mind is the seer now the seer within quotes the mind does not actually physically see anything it is aware of it thinks about it objectifies what the eyes that which was the seer earlier is now the scene the mind is the seer minds here by now i mean nowhere and the eyes are known seen again those three things many things the mind can think about not only the eyes the nose the ears all the sense organs in fact everything in the world the mind thinks about everything the mind being itself it can think about many things fear is one seen are many the mind being itself the things it thinks about keeps keeps on changing the mind keeps on changing also but mind changes into mind thoughts into more thoughts but the world changes in so many ways so the scene to keep changing the seer is relatively unchanging but most important the seer and the scene are different the mind which is the thinker of thoughts is different from what it thinks about so the mind is the seer and the eyes are the same what about the world the screen and the swami in the screen it's still the scene there's always the scene the eyes which were to see here earlier now have become the scene you go further the mind itself thoughts feelings emotions ideas memories these keepers coming and going this is what we call a mind but in and through all of that shining is this awareness now i am aware of my mind if you are not look into the mind you will find thoughts feelings emotions ideas questions swami i don't find anything good the mind is empty it's an emptiness you find emptiness so the mind thoughts and the absence of thoughts that is the seeing if it is the scene there must be a seer the mind has many many thoughts feelings emotions but the seer of all of them is one the mind keeps changing all the time from morning till night so many thoughts feelings ideas projects energetic tired bored all of that is changing all of them we must admit they were noted illumined revealed by one awareness and so the seer of the mind is unchanging the scene is changing the mind is changing and therefore the seer and the scene being different the seer of the mind must be different from the mind who are you when you are seeing the laptop and your through the eyes on which side are you there or here i am here when i am observing the eyes thinking about the eyes with the mind which side am i am i this the eyes which are an object or the mind which is the thinker i am the mind when i'm aware of the thoughts and feelings of the mind which am i am i a thought or a feeling or that which is aware of the thought and feeling and the awareness the awareness is the original one and only seer mind is seen eyes and sense organs and body is seen the world is seen the world body sense organs mind they are different from the awareness which you are i'm rushing through it if you want a more slow and careful exposition of this the whole teaching 12 parts drink risheve it's available on freely on the website of your youtube channel of the vedanta society of southern california drake richard bibeka about a 12-hour series on just this method i'm just rushing through it hoping that many of you have seen it already or some of it at least and this consciousness this awareness is who i am it is not changing it is not many it is not a thing out there it's an it's it's the pure subject never an object same thing we come through the panchakos the layer of the method of the five layers of the human personality uh which you find in the titanium upanishad second chapter of the titanium punisher start with the body the question is who am i and we try to find it in our experience start with the body physical body am i the body and then we see the body is changing from childhood to youth to middle age to old age and i am the same one who was the child and i agree that i was the young person i'm the middle aged person i am i'll be the old person that means child middle aged old these are the states of the body the body is changing and if i am one and the same i admit i was the same how can i the unchanging and the changing be the same thing changing and unchanging cannot be the same thing so i the unchanging experiencer of the changing body cannot be the body and then you another other ways are there you can apply drigrishya viveka here i am the witness i am the experiencer of the body the body is something that i experience and the seer and the scene must be different and so the body is not me you can apply awareness and you know objective awareness i am aware of the body the body is not aware of me i can say hey body you're doing well these days or you're not doing too well these days you need to lose weight the body never says to me hey swami how are you are you good the body never talks back to me body is not aware that i exist i am aware of the existence of the body i the awareness the body which is an object how can they be the same thing it's a thing it's as much of a thing as this book or this piece of cloth it's a thing i am aware the awareness of the thing i'm aware of the body then what am i i am not the body but i feel i am somewhere in there i am this awareness in there all right let's look in there subtler than the body inward to the body the breath then step by step they're going subtler and inward breath breathing in we did it for the buddhist meditation the buddhist was interested in using the breath as an anchor for awareness but what vedanta asks you to do is think about it are you the breath does the breath change yes of course breathing in breathing out the prana which is behind the breath is sometimes energetic sometimes tired sometimes healthy sometimes sick it changes and i am identified with all of them i say i am breathing in i am breathing out i am sick i am healthy i am hungry i am full these are all states of the prana i am the same one identified with different states of prana so i am not the prana because it changes i don't change it's an object i am the subject i am aware of it it is not aware of me i am not the prana in sanskrit these words are very simple and powerful savikar but where am i i'm somewhere in there okay inert to the prana deeper the mind thoughts emotions memories am i that most people stop there i'm the mind i'm the person i never really believed that i was the body but i am the person in the body i'm an embodied person same thing in the mind apply it does the mind change yes it does happy one one time sad or the other time forgetful at one time with the sharpest memory at the other time curious and bold um and so many things angry and peaceful which one are you if you are the mind which one are you you say no no sometimes i am angry sometimes i'm peaceful that means you are not tied with angry mind peaceful mind you are the one which experienced anger and absence of anger you're the one who experience curiosity and boredom it's the mind which is changing you are not changing so changing unchanging you cannot be the changing mind you are aware of the mind you are the seer of the mind rashtra and russia see rnc you the crnc must be different you cannot be the mind because you see the mind see means know the mind if you want you can introspect you can know the thoughts and feelings you do and even more stunning mind is not conscious or at least mind is not consciousness you are consciousness you are awareness you shining the mind is illumined the mind appears to be conscious but you are consciousness they are right there in the mind this awareness and a thought they are two different things thoughts come and go awareness does not come and go same awareness aware of happy thought same awareness aware of miserable thought awareness is not changed thought changed so um awareness and not aware you cannot be the mind you look further inwards the faculty of understanding intellect buddhi um one second the faculty of understanding the buddhi that um also we are not because that also changing our understanding is changing you're aware of your understanding and drastical industry and you are awareness even the buddhi understanding is not awareness that might sound like a strange thing to say so we are in such subtle realms that most people don't think in this way the intellect suppose you get something you suddenly understand that oh seer and see not different seer and seeing are different this thought seer and seeing a different this understanding the seer and scene are different this is also something you are aware of it's not aware this understanding seer and scene are different is it saying hey swami you got me all right it no it's not aware of me it's not aware of anything it's it's just a state of the buddhi of the intellect it's made a breakthrough that's all you are not the intellect also if you push beyond that you will hit a blank wall beyond the mind you'll hit just blankness you suppose you drop awareness of the mind no thinking no understanding no memory no desire blank but that blank is also an object because you are aware of the blank the awareness illumines the absence of thoughts which is that blankness which is basically what happens in deep sleep there's no thoughts no feelings no perceptions but that's a blankness the moment you wake up you recall a blankness where at the time of the blankness you cannot think if you think then this the mind is active but afterwards when the mind becomes active you can always reflexively go back and say that there was a time when the mind was not active which means that time was revealed by an awareness okay what i've just done is the five sheets of the human personality physical annamaya kosha vital pranamaya kosha mental manomaya kosha intellectual vigyanama kosha subtler and subtler and subtler inwards and inwards and inwards and the blankness beyond everything the darkness beyond the mind anandamayakosha the bliss sheep beyond these the witness of all of these illumining all of these their activities and their absence of their activities is is you the awareness you are not physical like the body the awareness is not physical you are not vital prana like the like the prana my kosher you are not a thought or an or an idea like the manoma or viganomic ocean you're not nothing either blankness like that my question your awareness you're of the nature of light you illumine activities of all these five sheets same thing do you notice by the way of the seer and the scene and by the way of these five sheets we are basically coming to the same awareness it is the same awareness which reveals your waking it reveals all our experiences in waking it illumines our dreams it illumines the deepness the the darkness of deep sleep also that is called the fourth in the way of the three three states waking dreaming deep sleep manduk upanishad that also points to that same awareness by the way of drinkdrishya seer and seen you it points to that one unchanging light of awareness which you are by the way of the five sheets panchakosha viveka it points to that one unchanging light of awareness which you are by the way of the three states of waking dreaming deep sleep mandukya i have what 50 60 classes on the mandu kyokarika all they point to you the unchanging awareness this is what this awareness is what is meant when the teacher says that thou art where here and everywhere when now and all the time you are that that reality what is that reality let's see what we have found it's like this awareness which we are in some sense we all know that we are awareness i mean it's not we don't think in terms of crc in five sheets and three states all that sounds very fancy but we all know we are aware but we are like that washer man who was not aware of the value of the diamond which he had got a story which srirama krishna tells of a washer man uh who so to think of india where the washerman would go around collecting your dirty laundry and would take it to the river bank and they would scrub it dry and they would use a stone to scrub you don't want to see what they do to your fancy clothes but they get it clean now this washer man he found a strange stone on the riverbank and he found it's very good for scrubbing clothes so he used it for scrubbing clothes now he thought it's it's rather unique and he had a good sense to go and ask he said i am an uneducated man but my friend the vegetable seller uh he is more knowledgeable about these things than me let me go and ask him and i he showed him that stone and he said how much will you give me for it the vegetable seller said i've never seen such a fancy stone i'll give you 10 rupees for it the washerman had a good sense too with hold onto the stone so finally the story is he goes to a jeweler a diamond merchant and the diamond emergency i've never seen such a huge diamond it's magnificent i'll give you 10 million rupees for it and so all the wants all these poverty of the washer man was removed because of that diamond which he had all the time and he was using it to scrub clothes and different people valued it differently until you went to the diamond merchant who said you have the solution to all your problems right there and you've been using it but you've been using it for to scrub clothes this awareness which we have which we are actually this is the solution this is the secret of the universe right there but we are using it like the washer man what do we use it for we use it day and night we use it to see and smell and taste and touch we use it to hear we use it to quarrel and we use it to feel unhappy we use it for to earn money and to fight wars and and to be miserable and we use it for learning philosophy and going to and becoming religious all the things of our life the entire drama of our life is played out by that that awareness that wash your mind stone which we have got let's now so luckily we have come to advaita which is the diamond merchant who's now going to introduce us to the wonders of this this stone which we have got his awareness which you have got what are the wonders you do not die sri krishna says in the bhagavad-gita he says death is just like he gives two wonderful examples one is very famous wasani just as you get rid of a suit of old clothes of soil clothes and put on a new suit similarly we get rid of this body and when it's no longer functional and we put on a new one see from a vedantic perspective what happens at death from mylantic perspective what's going on here you are that awareness there's no doubt but that awareness is clothed in as we just saw five sheaths so there's the sheath we called it the subtle body mind and intellect and prana and there's the sheath called the physical body the gross body so we have the physical body and the subtle body and there's something called the causal body also and beyond that that awareness which we are you see it sounds pretty speculative here swami not at all you can check right now you can check right now physical body nobody asks for proof everybody sees it it's a public fact here what about the subtle body that sounds esoteric no no no nothing is authentic about it just take a look you have thoughts and feelings and emotions ideas memories the very personality the person you think you are that's the subtle body that's all that's the subtle body technically advaita vedanta yeah we'll say it is prana maya kosha mano maya kosha big gyana maya kosher this is called sukshma shadira subtle body completely a matter of fact for you no doctor or scientist will be able to detect it and yet for you it's the most important fact aren't your thoughts of fact aren't your emotions and desires are fact aren't your memories and personality of fact for you the most important fact it's you it's what we normally think without any vedanta we normally think that's who i am tell me one doctor who has been able to detect one thought one neuroscientist who has been able to detect one perception none i tell you none i tell you it's in impossible in principle what can they detect they can detect at the most the subtlest activities in the physical body the tiny firings of bray of of neurons electrical activity in the neurons in the brain that's the last thing you can detect as long as you are using physical instruments the last thing you can detect is a physical activity but beyond that the subtle activity thoughts feelings emotions which are clear to every one of you if it's not clear to you you're a zombie the american term for zombie is that there's a physical living body but there's nobody inside the lights are off inside i trust none of us here are zombies so if you're not a zombie you have a subtle body but what the uniqueness of vedanta is normally we think that it's not a body that's me you're talking about me it's not you it's a body it's as much not you as these clothes are not you you may be wearing it now but they are not stuck to you they are not you just as you are not this suit of clothes you're wearing you are not even the physical body you're not even the subtle body but at death what happens is this the vedantic idea of death is the physical body dies so just last week we had a panel it was a pretty serious one of the most serious panels i attended they invited um a priest a rabbi and a swami and it's not a joke it's about it is just the opposite of a joke in fact it was about the most serious of things it was about dnr do not resuscitate so two hour long discussion about uh you know the very serious decision to let go of somebody if they have not given a dnr declaration do not resuscitate declaration how do you pull the plug can you should you would you could you um so this discussion but then what is the vedantic idea of death it's just the physical body what you see which happens physical body that dies not the person not the subtle body the swami prove it very easy actually you have two series going together body and mind but you have access as an outside observer you have access only to the body about the person inside we have only the reports coming from you from that body i have a thought i have a pain i have a desire i have a feeling who is telling you it's coming through that body now you know when the physical body dies that's death that second series to which you had only access to the physical body how are you claiming for sure that that series is also dead how do you know that series has no access to you anymore nor do you have any access to that it could still be going on but you just can't access it not relevant but it's such a touching story i would like to tell you here it came up in our discussions so um a few years back i happened to meet this gentleman in dallas he's a shaman you know what a shaman is um native american traditions so he is a bit of a psychic a very interesting character so he's known for being able to interact with um that second series you know after death um he can actually in some cases interact with the person he's very clear he says i have absolutely no it's a clear fact to me that people do not die with the death of the bodies in so many cases i have actually interacted with they have talked to me i have talked to them in some cases they have come back after a near-death experience and so we have corroborated it when the second the body also comes back the two series are together and that person says yes this is what you said to me this is what i said to you when i was so called the body was dead so but the touching story is this this this discussion was about do not resuscitate okay so it's uh but it's so moving i would like to share this with you so this gentleman he told us this story a gathering of people in dallas he said one of the most um moving cases that i was called in for was for a little girl who was brain dead and who was on life support machinery and there was no hope there's no chance medically there's no chance of coming back the body is finished i mean it's just been kept alive by these machines and they had even removed her from the hospital sent her back home for palliative not even palliative care just last few days and the parents were being urged to you know do that dnr i'll remove the life support and let her go and she was a very little kid and finally the parents agreed they said that they realized there's nothing else we can do actually and what's the point of just keeping a shell alive like this so the legal formalities so that called him in also and he also said yeah that's that's a good decision you can even do that and he said i had nothing more to do because there were lawyers there there was the police there there were doctors there they were at home and they wanted to pull the plug on that child and the parents were there so he said i went out i was sitting this shaman he said i was sitting in the lawn outside and i saw they taken the decision then finally the cars pulled out of the driveway the lawyers and the doctors and the police went away the technicians they packed up the machines they went away minutes later the parents shouted out to me and they implored me to come inside so he said i ran back inside what's wrong they expected that immediately the heartbeat which was supported at end would stop they removed the machines and it was all removed heartbeat and breathing and everything stopped within seconds it started back on again by itself so the heart is beating the child is breathing on her own without any machines now what do you do she's still technically brain dead there's no reaction she's in deep coma there is no feeding going on no breathing no heart machine no heart lung machine nothing no support are you going to kill her you like to actually have to suffocate her to well let her go away no but now what do you do now you remove the machines and she's living by herself so the parents were stunned what do we do now and they implored him can you do something so he said i can try and he put up like a like certain rituals he did and they have certain feathers they put in there and he said i clearly felt the presence of the little girl and i asked her what is the matter what are you doing and she said um i know i can't live in this body i will go but my mother will cry so i can't go you tell her to let me go so he actually told this it was so moving you know the people in the audience had there was hardly anybody with a dry eye there he said i told the mother and she agreed and she sat with that little child you know with the um and talked to her sweetly and said that we love you and we will always remember you and i know that you want to go don't worry i understand that you're still there but you have not gone anywhere and you'll be in a much better place and go happily we'll all be happy don't worry i'll be happy and as she went on saying this and the breathing stopped a heartbeat stopped and she was gone and he said i've clearly felt a presence move away from that place and she was gone now what an interesting thing that clearly the two cities are different so this is the idea that there's a subtle body which inhabits this physical body for some time and at death only the physical body falls away but vedanta pushes further you are not even the subtle body you are not even that person that individual human person which we are the personality even that changes that's changing continuously moment to moment thoughts feelings emotions likes dislikes lifetime after lifetime so many changes you are not even that you are that one light which is immortal even the subtle body is technically immortal in the sense why i'm saying technically because it changes and is subject to many kinds of modifications and finally it goes away also at the time of enlightenment it is said after the death of the physical body the subtle body also it's also a body it's also made of matter it's called subtle matter it melts back into a nature into into the ultimate reality it and you remain as uh unlimited consciousness so that's at the final birth the the birth in which you will be enlightened and when the that body dies the physical body dies and then that second series the subtle body also disappears so you are no longer encased in a in a body neither physical nor subtle anyway so that's the first thing we note about this consciousness it's immortal it does not die krishna says as you change clothes you change bodies death is is you have done it a thousand times earlier 10 000 times earlier nobody can stop this body from dying but it's really nothing to you you are masters at it you accomplish it just like that going from a body to the other body no need absolutely to be afraid of death one great great advantage bigger big step forward i am already that immortal awareness not physical body not even the subtle body even the subtle body will survive the death of this physical body i'm not even that i am there when the subtle body shuts down in deep sleep for example i'm still there but just that i can't think it's like the subtle body is like a set of apps you have a phone which can do many things only if you have the apps but all the material is there capacities are there if the app is working you can do those things therefore your phone can do those things but they are just apps the subtle body is a set of apps you've got second so immortal immortal in sanskrit nitya eternal you are that eternal awareness death is nothing to you it's a shadow passing on you you are that like the vast blue sky in which clouds gather and the movement of clouds and the storm that's a lifetime and slowly the clouds dissipate and it goes and the vast blue sky is left that's a life over but you were always the vast blue sky the clouds were born in you they played around in you and they disappeared back you are exactly the same okay second even deeper all that you are aware of the world the body the mind they are not real they are appearances they are nothing other than you the awareness appearing to you with names and forms a good example is this in your dreams as we fall asleep the world disappears before us we even the fact that i'm sleeping on the bed this physical body that also goes away a world appears a world of dreams appears to us places peoples objects activities and a body which i call myself i am in that dream too nowadays we can imagine it very nicely as a virtual reality so a kind of dream virtual reality appears to us in every dream and we are active we say things we do things and we feel it's like a living experience we don't doubt it now when we wake up we realize all those places and people and activities including the body which i thought i was all of that merges back into me the dreamer's mind and i realized none of that was anything apart from my i did not actually go to those places i did not actually meet those people i did not actually do those things or eat that stuff uh or say those things also all of it was my mind playing around projecting it this awareness has projections what are these projections this projections first projection of awareness is the mind a sense of i and thoughts and emotions and ideas and memories the next set of projections is a sense of senses seeing smelling tasting touching and then the next set of projections is an object to the senses forms that you see um touch things which you touch smell and taste and all those objects of your senses and that what that's what constitutes a so-called physical solid world out there they are sensory uh experiences appearing to the sense powers which are projections from the mind which is a projection from awareness none of it actually physically a second reality apart from awareness not being a second reality apart from awareness this is called non-dualism non-dualism of the awareness it appears to be a second i like that story about that businessman you know in india who got into debt and uh so he had to pawn off his favorite uh image of ganesha and he goes to the gold gold the dweller and says give me some money and keep this image of ganesha how much will you give me for ganesha this much money how much will you give me for the mouse then you're going to share a little mouse golden mouse and he said it's the same rate same by the same weight the man was furious what ganesha that god has the same rate as a mouse the goldsmith said sir to you it's ganesha and it's a mouse for me it's gold in the same way these are names and forms which appear names forms and activities names forms and functions in sanskrit nama rupa bahara appearing on the surface of the radiance of consciousness which you are you are that consciousness everything that you experience is not a second reality up here apart from you if you see yourself as a body and a person these are all second realities imagine you in your dream whatever you see appears to be a second reality apart from you but the moment you wake up everything that you saw in your dream was you from your consciousness perspective from your body perspective all these are separate from you but from your awareness perspective all this world is nothing other than what you sense all that you sense is nothing other than your mind and all your mind is nothing other than like waves on the surface of an ocean the ocean of consciousness which you are it's a non-dual reality there's a logic behind it there's no time that's why i'm not telling you i want to explore a little further this is the meaning of brahma satyam jagat mithya brahman or consciousness you are the reality and the world is an appearance what is the world the world you see hear smell taste what's be seeing hearing smelling tasting is nothing apart from you the mind you the mind is nothing apart from the consciousness which is the real you the world is an appearance the world is not a second reality apart from you but this is also another way of saying that everything in the world is you you see god is the only reality the world is false they're the same statement can you think about it in this way all this is nothing other than god all this is false it is false as an independent separate material world which we think about it no that's not that's not the reality but as god it's the reality and we're talking about the same thing it is the same thing to say brahma satyam and jagat mithya the same thing to say the rope is real and the snake is false the same thing you are saying the same thing if this world were real then brahman the ultimate reality would have to be some other reality because this is a real world but the world is not real in ignorance it's a world in knowledge it is you the consciousness another point there is no limit to this consciousness right now we feel they are limited and what do i mean limited here i am i am here in new york and in manhattan and in the vedanta society in my room in my chair i'm limited i'm limited in space i'm limited in time i was born on that date so many years ago and i'm going to die in a few few years hence since some particular date i'm limited in time i had a beginning i'll have an end and i'm limited as a person this person i'm not anything else i'm just server priyananda these limits are not there in consciousness consciousness or this awareness brahman atman whatever you call it the real you unlimited how so space is in you the awareness you the awareness are not in space i like this i tell this example many times when this was being taught in a ashram in haridwar a monk at the back you know when the teacher said uh you are all pervading awareness and the monk at the back raised his hand and said hey wait a minute hold it right there let alone being all pervading i am right here i'm not even there where you are teaching from i'm just here sitting in my seat how can i be all pervading i don't even pervade this hall i'm here not there in hindi i'm here not there how can i be all pervading and the answer was wonderful the teacher said you know he said but here and there are did not both in your awareness suppose you say in your dream it's a dream you don't know it's a dream i'm sitting here and then somebody comes to me in the dream and says look all of this the park and the sky and the place and all these people they are all in you all space is within you i say what nonsense i'm right here i'm not even there and those places are far apart that's the east side of manhattan that's the west side of manhattan they're all separate from me but when i wake up who will be right that man in the dream who told me the whole thing was within you will be right so okay that's an example of of a dream but how is that true in the waking state in the waking state think about it where is the limit of your awareness let's see but swami what do you mean take a look around you can only see the limits of your walls what's beyond your walls is beyond your awareness no there's a difference between perception knowledge and awareness what i see here it is in my awareness as the scene but there is something vast beyond this i know it's in my awareness as the unseen unknown but still in my awareness if i ever were to see it i would see it only in my awareness if i ever had to hear it i would hear it only in my awareness the world exists as known and unknown in awareness and this set sets of known and unknown they are permeable sets sometimes things keep coming from the unknown set into the known going from the known set into the unknown known and unknown together make up your awareness [Music] so there is no limit to your awareness time is not a limit space is not a limit time and space are in awareness awareness is not in time and space awareness is you're not a slice of awareness located in a particular space rather space is something that appears to you in awareness just like a dream time you are not like a flash of awareness moving from past to present to future past present and future move back and forth in you the awareness just track it in your experience you will see it is true time and space do not limit you you are unlimited in time and space it's like a like water if you look at the waves in the ocean the waves seem to have boundaries this way that way in that wave but if you look at water where is the boundary between one wave and the other it's all water the wave is water that wave is watered in between is also water the boundary also is water it's one seamless water in the same way it's one seamless awareness which appears as you the subject and the objective universe you the seer and the scene swami vivekananda says one alone exists it appears as nature and soul nature means this material universe soul means the experiencing person it is one seamless whole one endless without any distinction without any barrier one one awareness the universe is one with you am i one with the universe no this is an interesting thing all the movies on the screen are one with the screen no movie no tragedy no comedy nothing good and bad movies nothing can exist without the screen but the screen is not one with the movies screen can is completely independent of the movies it can exist with a comedy it can exist with a tragedy it can exist without a movie you are like that scream in awareness all the worlds they exist in you none of them exist apart from you but you the consciousness the awareness you can exist apart from the worlds when the words disappear in the great pralaya the dissolution of the words at the end of the cycle of the universe are in deep sleep you are the awareness you still exist you are unlimited and this awareness is not an object very important where is this awareness what is this how can i grasp it you can never grasp it as an object krishna says it's not an object of knowledge apramiya prama means the instrument of knowledge so or correct knowledge brahmara is this instrument by which you know so the eyes see eyes are an instrument of knowledge ears are an instrument of knowledge inference is an instrument of knowledge and so and so forth all of them reveal objects in the world eyes reveal forms ears reveal sound scientific inference reveal scientific truths about the world and all of them are powered illumined by you the awareness none of them reveal you you reveal them instrument of knowledge pramana the object of knowledge premiere and the knowledge brahma instrument instrument of knowledge eyes object of knowledge um this this book eyes are the instrument of knowledge this is the object of knowledge and the knowledge i'm having that i see the book all three are revealed by i the consciousness either nor the eyes themselves the um the book and the knowledge of the book are revealed by either consciousness you the consciousness you shining everything else shines by your light everything is lit up it is the pure subject it's never an object the ken openishad says this again and again what by which the mind thinks but which the mind cannot think about that is consciousness that is awareness the mind does it look at it right now it's not being they're not being cute or being very profound this is telling a fact all the thoughts of the mind all the thinking memories desires they're all there in awareness by that the mind thinks it awareness reveals the activities of the mind but nothing in the mind can reveal awareness it's like the sun shines on the moon and the moonlight reveals the world consciousness or awareness shines on the mind and the mind can think about the world but the moonlight does not reveal the sun it's impossible first of all the moonlight is nothing other than the sunlight and second the moonlight is not necessary to reveal the sun the sun blazes forth with its own light a million times more bright so similarly you the consciousness you shining on the mind and the senses you reveal thoughts and seeing and hearing and smelling and tasting and their respective objects none of them can reveal you what the by which the eyes see but which the eyes cannot see know that to be brahman not what you think is as this object it's not something that you see or hear or smell or taste or touch or think about or speak about but all thinking speaking hearing smelling tasting touching are because of that in language of the upanishads that shining everything else shines by its light everything is illumined you shining everything else shines by your light everything is illumined one more point we are all exploring this awareness which you are this awareness the way i'm talking about it is it subject to change can it change or is all change revealed by awareness birth aging death health disease movement all of these changes in the world they are revealed by awareness does the awareness itself change can it change logically it's impossible if it does change and that awareness if you can note that change then to what will it be revealed it's two awareness alone who else will reveal the change in the awareness accept awareness then that change becomes an object it's no longer awareness do you see what i mean if there is a change in something in the world it is revealed to you the awareness if there is a change in you the awareness to what will it be revealed is it revealed to me the awareness in that case you are the revealer of the change the change is no longer in you remember seer and seen are different you might say at this point well there might be a change in media awareness which i might not know about which i might not reveal if that is so there's no use talking about it if there is then anything you can talk about which can never be known so if it cannot ever be known no need to talk about it it should at least be in principle be knowable or illuminable by uh consciousness so consciousness does not change you the awareness you do not change everything else changes what have we been saying so far i'll put it together you the awareness revealed by the method of drinkdrishya seer and seen you the awareness revealed by the method of the five sheets you the awareness revealed by the method of the three states waking dreaming and deep sleep that awareness is immortal will not die is not born either it reveals the birth and death of the body it reveals the transmigration like that little girl going away from the dying body to uh to its destiny that subtle body going from body to body that is revealed by you the awareness you are that immortal awareness no death for you second you are the reality everything else is only your appearance you are real the world is an appearance jagat mithya means you are the reality of which the world you the awareness not you the person you the awareness is the reality the person immediately says that's cool i'm the only reality no if you if you think you're the only reality of the person that's the philosophical fault called solipsism no you are the reality as as the one awareness the world is an appearance it's not a second reality apart from you therefore you the awareness are non-dual advaitam third you the awareness are limitless space does not limit you because it appears in you you are not appearing in space just like a dream time does not limit you you are the experiencer of time time does not experience you no object no being no nothing in the world limits you because they all are in you just as a wave cannot limit water right a wave cannot limit water because every bit of the wave is water only nothing in the world can limit you you are unlimited you are not an object you are the pure subject apra you reveal the activities of the mind intellect senses they do not reveal you you are the pure subject therefore you cannot be known as an object you cannot be seen smell touched tasted youth awareness you cannot be taught about you cannot be expressed in language but all of that is being done because of you your presence you blessing the senses and the mind and the intellect the senses can see hear smell taste touch like a mind can think intellect can understand memory can remember um all of it functions because of you all of it is active because of you and they are remember they are nothing other than you they are all appearances in you and you are beyond any kind of change all changes are in this world of appearance you do not change therefore putting it all together you are not subject to this cycle of birth and death you are not a part of this chain of karma you are not a doer of deeds nor are you the sufferer of the consequences of those deeds though you reveal the entire game it's only because you the consciousness the the the mind illumined by the consciousness and associated with the body does deeds and the so-called person gets the results of those deeds karma functions at that level you are not bound by karma but karma appears in you so you are free of this whole cycle of karma this freedom from the cycle of karma is called moksha mukta but swami that means i am free right now yes you are you are free right as consciousness you are free of karma the moksha which vedanta talks about which all these systems of philosophy have been talking talking about to attain moksha liberation freedom from cycle of birth and freedom from karma you have it already it's your very nature you are free because you are eternal immortal because you are the reality of which the world is an appearance non-dual because you are limitless in which time and space have their play but you are not in that because you are changeless because of that you are free of karma you are free of bondage you are liberated knowing this reality understanding it is the result of shravana and manana once some kind of clarity dawns and you can see right now it's not all that easy but once that kind some kind of clarity dawns then you move on to the next stage of making it a living reality through meditation when we do it through living living reality through meditation that is called jivan mukti living liberation that we can actually manifest that we can live that truth in our day-to-day activities in the midst of aggravations in the midst of being acting like an embodied being in the midst of all of these others so you will play this role of being the person but now you know you are not a person anymore you are an impersonal reality an infinite impersonal reality living like that is called jivan mukti free while living and that's the goal of advaita so we'll take it forward in the next class i've gone a little bit over time but i think i've been able to convey quick outline what did i do what is vedanta what are the main texts what it is not what is vedanta what it is not vedanta is very simple what it is not what is the process hearing reflection meditation then the actual inquiry method of sear and seeing method of the five sheets method of the three states all of these they take months and months to explain and i've got there are talks and they're available all over the place um then having got a good grasp on what the teaching is you explore it realize your immortality realize your infinitude realize that you are the truth of which the world is an appearance realize that you are beyond change and beyond death realize that you are already free then make it living make it a fact make it effortless make it effortless how do you do that and that is what we'll see in the next two classes [Music] my [Music] you

Channel: Vedanta Video

Views: 13,932

Keywords: Vedanta, religion, god, karma, meditation, ramakrishna, vivekananda, brahman, hindu

Id: pN7rQyVs-4I

Length: 100min 43sec (6043 seconds)

Published: Sun May 09 2021