The Yoga of Self-Inquiry | Swami Sarvapriyananda

[Music] [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 uh i would like to thank uh rkm very the organizers especially reviewed swami atma priyanandaji for inviting me to be on this webinar organized on the occasion of the international day of yoga yoga was in one sense popularized in the united states long way back by swami vivekananda and a few years ago in the wall street journal there was an article by annie bardack it said that the man who bought it was about swinging vivekananda and it was titled the man who bought yoga to the west and in that article she remarked humorously that yoga which is so popular people don't know that it was swami vivekananda a monk from india who actually bought this to the united states to the west in at large but all these people who are rushing to the yoga studios wearing uh the stretch pants and trying to do all sorts of physical you know contortions asanas and so on would be surprised if they heard him what actually swami vivekananda taught he said you are not the body which seems to be a sort of axiomatic for people who go to yoga practices here that i am the body and i have to take care of the body and the body is all i have swami vivekananda said you are not the body and they would be even more surprised perhaps when they hear him say you are not even the mind so this is basically the theme of uh this this talk which we have uh now this talk about the yoga of self-inquiry what vivekananda really bought to the united states and to the west at large was these higher yogas not just the physical yoga the hata yoga which became more popular later on with the arrival of ienger and others but we were cutting the bar to the west the gyana yoga which we'll talk about today the yoga of devotion bhakti the yoga of meditation raja yoga in fact his classic text raja yoga was written here right here in new york and published from new york karma yoga how to transform our activities our actions uh into uh spirit into how to spiritual spiritualize our actions so these are various paths to self-realization perhaps the path we are going to talk about today is unique and it can be called the direct path to self-realization let me explain what i mean by that vedanta tells us that we are brahmana we are existence consciousness bliss in our real nature we are immortal beyond suffering if only we would realize that in fact swami vivekananda often used that language you know when he met his disciples sometimes he would say if only you knew what you truly were so how do we know what we are that is the that is the goal of this path of self enquiry let me make this a little more clear in the path of self-enquiry why is it so unique in the path of self-inquiry we the the spiritual journey that we undertake is not a journey in space by that what i mean is in a traditional and popular religion often the goal is said to be or understood to be a heaven or a place where god exists so somewhere else this is not heaven right now where we are but there is some place which is perfect much better and we have to go there and that is heaven so it's a journey in space here in this country sometimes you come across big billboards advertisements put up by churches and one one said heaven is a place and then below it will be written some phone number will be written you know call one eight zero zero something like that you have to call to get information about how do you belong to the church so heaven is a place but the path of self inquiry the path of gyana yoga way of knowledge um there we we are talking about that you are drama that uh reality which is everywhere all pervasive so it is not a particular place that you have to go to uh to attain or to realize the goal of gyana yoga to realize that you're brahmana you don't have to go to a particular place it's not a journey in space it is also not a journey in time sometimes we put the goal of spirituality in in language the language of time another billboard i saw was after death you will see god and again below that it was written call one eight zero zero something like that to certain so if after death when you see after after is a time word that means god is not now but god is after death the goal of spirituality is after death or after something after some even after you know the the messiah comes or after um one attains samadhi or something like that some kind of spiritual experience after that only you will get the goal of spiritual life in vedanta again the reality that we are looking for is always there nithyam so was there earlier it is there now it will be there later on so it's not a question of going through time to some other time when you will get it so if it's not a journey in space it's not a journey in time is it a journey to something else i am this person and i'm seeking something else apart from me that also is not not the journey in the path of knowledge it is not a journey in uh it's not a journey from myself to something else because the essence of the path of knowledge is that you are that so i am that reality it's not a journey from myself to something else so it's not a journey in space it's not a journey in time it's not a journey from one object to another so what kind of a journey are we are we going to undertake a spiritual journey what kind is it when we talk about self-inquiry so the journey here is a journey from ignorance to knowledge ignorance to knowledge from avidya from agyana to ghana from not knowing what we truly are to knowing and realizing what we truly are so the claim is that we do not know who we really are and we one might object at this point i know that i am i exist and i know who i am i'm swami server what is the need uh to do self-inquiry i already know that but vedanta claims that we do not know ourselves as we are truly we have a very partial impact a very erroneous concept of ourselves i know that i exist and if i'm asked to give further details about who or what i am can i describe myself i wouldn't we would normally say that here i am this um this person this body you know if you ask me to point out where are you and say here here what are you this one and what is this this is i and i am this so this is the way we would normally describe ourselves and vedanta says that this is an erroneous conception of the self when we conceive of ourselves as the body which we do when we do not reflect about it we normally think of ourselves as the body and speak and behave as if we were the body and when we do that vedanta says that you're making a very serious mistake and it's because of this mistake that we suffer let us not forget the whole goal of gyana yoga of the whole goal of all these yogas including hatha yoga is to overcome suffering is to overcome suffering is to attain fulfillment and the unique message of yani yoga is that if that our suffering is actually due to our erroneous conception about ourselves it's not really due to the disease of the body it's not really due to covet it's not nearly due to financial hardship it's not really due to relationship problems it's not due to physical problems or mental problems it's due to a wrong idea suffering is due to a wrong conception about ourselves so we know we exist but what we think about ourselves is wrong and to discover what we truly are this is the goal of the path of knowledge the yoga of knowledge self inquiry is the method an inquiry into what we are truly why an inquiry because when we are seeking knowledge the only method is enquiry we have to find out we have to know where to go from not knowing to knowing this also one should distinguish from the other paths one path which we is which is very common in religions and religions of the world is the path of belief so one path will tell you that especially the path of bhakti it tells you that there is an ultimate reality called god and by the grace of god you will overcome your suffering you will attain fulfillment but you have to believe in god why well on certain grounds because our scriptures say so because holy people enlightened persons have told you that god exists god is good god is all-powerful if you love god believe in god you will you will attain fulfillment eventually maybe not in this life but maybe eventually and notice the whole thing depends on faith on belief if you start with skepticism if you start by asking i can i don't believe in god then that path will not work on you will not work for you it starts with some kind of faith which is a little difficult these days especially in the age of the new militant atheists you know richard dawkins and christopher richards and so on who attack this kind of beliefs but this is the general idea about religion actually in this country in the united states the word normally used for religion is faith which literally means it's belief but when you come to something like advaita vedant or even buddhism or even yoga patanjali yoga it doesn't does not seem to be a system of faith um as against this path of faith is the path of experience path of mystical experience which one might broadly sort of classify patanjali yoga um you know general field of mysticism that path says that you don't have to believe rather you can experience it we will teach you a set of exercises you sit in this way meditate in this way visualize in this way control the mind focus and you will attain certain samadhi certain mystical states by which the truth of religion will be revealed to you swami vivekananda popularized this approach it was something remarkable the masses here in the united states did not know that it was open to everybody that one could experience the truths of the claims of religions for oneself as swami vivekananda said if i have an immortal soul i must feel it if god exists i must see god how do you do that by these psychophysical exercises taught in yoga one will get certain extraordinary experiences certain mystical experiences which will prove to be the claims of religion that religion is true now the only problem with this this is wonderful the problem with this is that it can again be doubted if you ask a neuroscientist the neuroscientist will tell you that yes we don't doubt you feel that you are having an experience of god or oneness or something like that but it's actually a little bit of a problem in your brain a little uh tumor in your brain or some kind of neurons malfunctioning there and you're getting you feel you're getting this experience but that does not prove that you are actually experiencing god or oneness it can be doubted and i'm sure most modern materialistic reductionist scientists would doubt the veracity of such experiences but anyway that's one major path the path of extraordinary experience in contrast to these two paths the path of belief faith the path of mystical extraordinary experience obtained through meditative practices there is this path of self-inquiry the path of self-inquiry does not demand that you believe in anything in fact you must not believe it you have to question and understand it also does not demand that you have get you get extraordinary experiences it depends on our what is available to everybody i mean who does not have the experience of being awake of sleeping of dreaming if you have the experience of waking dreaming deep sleep jagrath swapna sushupti that's enough the path of self-inquiry says now we will inquire into this experience which is the common experience not a mystical experience which we all share we will inquire into this experience and we we will guide you into seeing what underlies this the real nature of the self i am the experiencer and the world is experienced i am the subject the world is the object i am the seer and the world is seen who does not have this in fact this is the structure of all experience subject object if you have this much then also the path of self inquiry can guide you we will see today it can guide you to um to enlightenment to realization of the true self or the path of the you know the method of the five sheets we all experience the body we experience the prana we experience the mind and the intellect and also in deep sleep the causal body of the anandamaya the once you have an experience you everybody has this experience of the five sheets that is that is enough uh for beginning or or proceeding on the path of self-inquiry so this is the path of self-inquiry it's pretty unique and uh in our tradition it is the direct path we might say the royal path to enlightenment i have distinguished it from from bhakti from patanjali yoga but also i must say that you know in the traditional approach none of the yogas are excluded in the path of self-inquiry devotion selfless karma and meditation they are all very useful they are not central but they are very useful they are foundational they prepare the mind for the path of self-inquiry so let us today take a look at what the path of self-inquiry looks like what is this yoga of self-inquiry and how do you practice it and what will be the result there are different procedures as i have in indicated which you find in the upanishads in the titanopanisha you find the procedure of the methodology of the five sheets of um analyzing the five sheets and realizing who we truly are that's the method of self-inquiry in the thirteen o'clock in the mandu kyopanishad we find the method of the self-inquiry based on the three states of waking dreaming and deep sleep i was that today i'll take up a simple but powerful method based on this little uh non-dualistic text drive it literally means the discrimination or the the in the you know looking into the or the analysis of the seer and the scene and distinguishing the seer from the scene uh the very first verse which i will take up now now we are going into the the the actual method of self inquiry we will take up one verse from this the first one which gives us the method in a nutshell now before we go into it what we have to do here is you listen to these teachings and you try to see that have i heard what the teaching is that's step one hearing the teachings shravana the second step is have i understood what was said do i get it at this stage one may have many questions and one should ask those questions and clarify so that so that one can claim i have understood what is being said not only have i heard the teachings but i also understood the teachings now the only thing is do i feel it is a fact is it a living reality to convert it into a living reality with swan with vivican under called assimilation what we have heard and what we are convinced of you have to stay with that and there are various techniques of vedantic meditation which allow you to stay with this new knowledge those are called needed dhasana techniques so shravana mananananan is hearing the teaching you receive the knowledge manana is reflecting about it so that we can understand it we clear up all questions misapprehensions about it and then uh stay with it stay with this new knowledge assimilate it swami vivekananda says tell yourself again and again i am that or i am he till it tingles with every drop of your blood he calls it assimilation of this knowledge so that is the procedure and you can simplify it further keep in mind these three questions what did he say when i'm going to talk about the method which we should ask what did he say and can i repeat it back to myself have i got the teaching step one that completes travana step two would be do i get it do i understand it if i say yes then i've completed step two i know the teaching and i've understood it step three is the most important one and that takes time and that is is it real is it a fact for me right now when i say i am this body it's a fact for me it's something that i don't generally doubt so like that when we will say i am brahmana i am the witness consciousness is it a fact for me or is it just some kind of feels like a theory let us dive straight into the teaching itself the first verse of this little text says rupam drisham lojandrik [Music] beautiful and incisive verse and what a beginning the entire teaching is summed up there so what it does is in four steps we will be taken from our present identification with the body which vedanta holds or the path of knowledge holds to be an error to an appreciation to a knowledge of what we truly are in four steps and the method is the method of the seer and the scene and there's nothing very esoteric about this method it's just that what we are experiencing now i am looking at the screen so i am the seer and the screen is the scene similarly we start there and then we go deeper and deeper holding on to the principle of seer and seeing what is the seer and what is the scene i've always identified myself with the seer and then using that we will dive deeper and deeper and change our understanding of the seer hold on to this idea that the seer and the scene are different we will give up this idea later on finally but at first it's a very obvious thing to hold on to here are my glasses and the glasses are the scene i am the seer so i am seeing it these are the scene and clearly the glasses are different from me the seer and the sea not different the sea not different from the seer different by different i mean a different entity the first part says rupam drishyam lochanam drik rupam literally means colors but you can just say form colors and shapes and whatever is seen by the eyes is rupam the what we see with the eyes is different from the eyes what we see seems to be out there i can see a lot of things in this room i can see some of you on the screen and that's different from the eyes the eyes are seeing the forms and this is pretty obvious but note three things about this the seer and the scene are different number one the seer is more or less it's remaining the same the same eyes but what is being seen keeps changing the seer is stable and the scene are changing now you're before this you're seeing something else now you're looking at this webinar after that after some time you'll see something else the scene keep changing and the seer remains relatively stable and the third point is the seam are many the forms are so many different colors shapes people animals you know sky earth trees all of these things so many thousands and thousands of entities are being seen but by the same seer the pair of eyes the seer is one by which i don't i mean that the organ of vision is one i don't mean that you're one-eyed but the seer is one and the scene are many so we have got three things we have noted but just by the simple act of looking at the world the seer the eyes are different from the scene and this the eyes remaining the same the scene are continuously changing the eyes are one and the same the scene are many okay you might say that's pretty obvious ask yourself those three questions did i hear what he said do i understand it and is it a fact does it feel like a theory or is it is it real and you say yes it is real i'm looking this is real and i'm seeing so many things this is real there's nothing theoretical about it just a description of what what i'm experiencing right now very good now we go a little deeper in the second part of the verse the second part of the verse is the eyes now become the seed and the mind is the seer consider now the draw your attention to the eyes here you're first looking at your attention was on the objects out there now draw your attention to the seer the eyes and note the eyes themselves are objects of my knowledge i am aware that my eyes are open i'm aware that my eyes are closed i'm aware that i need glasses for my eyes i'm aware that i can see very well or i'm aware that i cannot i cannot see very well the eyes and their functioning we are aware of it it's an object of our awareness of our understanding who or what is aware of the eyes the mind is aware of the eyes it is the mind which thinks about the eyes mind is the seer and the eyes are now the scene and now we are using the words here and seeing not in the sense of visual sensation but as a sense of knowledge the mind is the knower seer means here nowhere mind knows and what does the mind know the eyes that which was earlier taken in a very simple naive way as the seer the world was seen forms were seen eyes are the seer now the eyes themselves we recognize yes they are objects also my mind objectifies the eyes i am aware of the eyes and they are functioning and their problems so the mind is the seer the eyes become the same what about the world the world remains the same world is always the scene the eyes which were taken as the seer now they have also become part of the scene they become objects which we are aware of and not just the eyes all the other sense sense organs which were the seer earlier now they are in the category of the scene they are the darshan earlier now in the category of the drishyam the scene and note those three points again about it that the seer and the scene are different the mind whatever it is must be different from the eyes the eyes are here it's an organ of vision the mind is quite different from it feels quite different composed of thoughts feelings emotions um so the mind is different from the sea uh the eyes fear and scene are different the mind remaining the mind it is aware of so many changes in the eyes in the other sense organs so the scene are continuously changing the seer is relatively stable you might say the mind is not stable the mind keeps having so many thoughts and feelings and emotions but yes the mind changes into more mind but all the others they are such a variety the earth and the eyes and the nose and the skin and the and the objects out there they have enormous variety they keep changing so much the seer is unchanging relatively and the scene are changing the seer is one the mind in itself is one as as the mind but the seen are many rashta is one drishy are many dushta is unchanging this are changing and relatively unchanging and the drishyam are changing and rashta and russia are separate they're two separate things and this also it seems pretty obvious you know the three questions did i hear what he said yes the mind is the seer and the sense organs eyes are the same um did i um understand it it's pretty obvious it doesn't it's not very problematic and is it a fact if you inquire you will feel i think everybody feels it's a fact that i that the mind is different from the eyes so the seer is the mind let us inquire deeper we go to the third uh step and this here it becomes interesting notice so far it seems to be just a labeling of what we already know what we already experienced the third step is the third quarter of the verse is drishya dhirittaya sakshi consider the mind itself is the mind known are we aware of the mind we are actually there is a word for that introspection when we become when we take our attention and put it on thoughts we were thinking about the eyes earlier now thinking notice the thoughts themselves the thoughts of i am happy i'm sad i there's a pain i'm anxious i'm curious i am listening to what this person is saying these are all thoughts in the mind and we are aware of the thoughts often we may not put our attention there but the thoughts are going on when we put our attention to our own thoughts the word is introspection we are looking into our thoughts that means the thoughts themselves which the mind is comprised of they become objects thoughts feelings memories they become objects subtle objects so what is the distinction between subtle and physical physical is the the stroller the body the external objects which is our public shared reality you can see it i can see it the doctor can examine this body but the subtle is that which we have a direct first person experience of but not available to others my thoughts the thoughts going on in this mind i am aware of it but nobody even even the most subtlest of instruments fmri scan cannot actually access the thought they may access the the neural correlate of the thought but they cannot access they cannot think the thought so that which i have a direct first person experience is called the subtle sukshma but we cannot doubt it exists every one of us we are aware that we have thoughts feelings all of us unless we are you know the zombies we all have thoughts feelings emotions and what this text tells us to note is the path of self-inquiry tells us to notice is that these thoughts also are objects they're objects of of my awareness i am aware of these thoughts in my awareness these thoughts arise in my awareness they play around in my awareness they disappear these thoughts come and go now notice then what happens that awareness which i am i am aware of the thoughts that awareness becomes the the seer the thoughts are now the scene that mind which was the seer earlier is now the scene we are aware of it like an object and the same observations apply drastica and rishi are separate this is a major breakthrough this is something not normally understood and even by modern consciousness studies that awareness consciousness and the mind they are not the same thing awareness is awareness of the mind awareness but if it's awareness of the mind awareness is the drastica the seer and mind is the scene and the seer and seen are different they are different entities therefore awareness must be different from the mind which it is aware of and again notice the mind is full of a variety of thoughts thoughts feelings emotions good bad they all come and go and the awareness is the same if you abstract thoughts from awareness then you begin to see awareness is homogeneous awareness is like a light the light here falls on so many things on the table the table has many things um there's the computer there's a book and there's the pen and the glasses and so many objects are there on the table they're all revealed by the same light when the light reveals the book and the light reveals the glasses light does not change book and glasses are different objects the light which is shining on them is not different similarly the awareness which reveals a variety of thoughts perceptions is one and the same those thoughts and perceptions are many so drishyam is many drastica is the same and then we also come to that important insight the third one that drastica is unchanging and the drishya are changing continuously that which the thoughts feelings emotions are changing they're not only many they're changing and the awareness is unchanging so why not say that the awareness is also changing if the awareness is changing if you're aware of the change of the awareness then the change becomes an object and it's not in awareness it's an object of awareness so it cannot be that the awareness is changing rather awareness is aware of changes you cannot logically actually speak about a change of the awareness itself because awareness reveals that change so three three observations drastic and rishi are different awareness consciousness i'm using it um indifferently awareness consciousness is the is different from the all the the con contents of the mind mind is the drishya and awareness is the drastic consciousness is the drasta and the mind is the remember sense organs are also rishi and the world out there of course is drishya always the scene not the seer consciousness is always the seer rashta never the seen and in between you have mind and the sense organs which played the role of the seer for some time but now we have firmly put them in the category of the sea in order this mind is unchanging one and the seer drasta nirvikara and also akam one here itself we can find something very interesting you see all our problems are in the category of the seeing physical pain the body and the body is the scene the physical pain is experienced in the body so it is also an object if you have experienced pain you know we say that i am in pain the if you apply this dashta and rishya this dashtadishya viveka then the question will be this you are in pain yes and are you aware of the pain yes if you are aware of the pain then the pain is adrishya you are the drashta you have just admitted you are aware of the pain and if you are aware of the pain the pain is adrishya you are the drashta and remember the first point darstandrishi are separate so you and the pain are separate you cannot be in pain you are aware of the pain the moment the pain you're aware of the pain pain must be something an object of your awareness it is not that awareness is in pain awareness reveals the pain in the body awareness itself is free of the pain [Music] this is an interesting very subtle insight when shankaracharya in one place in upper description he teaches this to the student student says but it burns when my fingers burnt it burns i cannot say this my body is an object like this object if you do something to this object i am not affected but if you pinch my body or the body's you know like it touches the flame it burns and there's so much pain so how can i say this body is an object but then the analysis shankaracharya says ah there is pain are you aware of the pain yes then the pain is also an object and if it is an object the object is different from the subject the scene is different from the seer the rashta is different from this they are separate entities if you notice carefully the pain is also a separate entity from yourself it can go very far to that incident where srirama krishna a cancer patient whose throat cancer one doctor told me it's one of the worst forms of cancer cancer throat cancer and suffering terminally ill and his student hari who later became swami turian and comes and asks sir how are you today and sudama krishna says oh it hurts here i cannot eat and then hurry god knows what he saw he said but sir i see you are in great bliss which would be a cruel thing to say to a cancer patient this is your in great bliss and sudama krishnas reaction is extraordinary quite unlike any cancer patient he says oh the rascal has found me out meaning that actually i'm in great place now was he lying that there is no that about the pain there's a pain i cannot eat was he lying about the suffering no was he pretending that about the suffering no the suffering is there as the body is there the tumor is there and the pain caused by the tumor and the suffering caused is there is experienced but here i am something that is aware of this experience and yet independent of it in that true nature in the seer in the the consciousness which is the witness of that there is no trouble at all the pain is there i am here i am the pain are different that witness consciousness was aware of a state where there was no pain before the cancer before the burning of the finger is aware of the pain now and again the pain will go the drishya keeps changing this but the seeing consciousness the the witness consciousness is still the same and the drishi are many you're aware of pain you're aware of pleasure and aware of many things but the awareness is one and the same unchanging drastica is one drishya is separate from it is one drishyam are many rustica is unchanging rishi is changing what is this drasta it is called sakshi the objects of this sakshi are dhivrittaya the movements of the manchetta now this witness consciousness which we discover here is free of the movements of the mind it is free of the movements of the the the conditions of the body the good and bad conditions problems in the physical body problems in the mind it is free of them it is aware it illumines them it reveals them but just as the light shining here if it shines on ganges water it's not the light is purified if it shines on drain water it's not that the light becomes impure the light reveals both impartially similarly this consciousness which we are that reveals everything in this world and in the body and in the mind and yet is free and untouched by them the method of self-inquiry reveals this fact now immediately we before we go on to the last quarter of this verse let me ask the three questions did you hear the teaching what was said yes i have heard hopefully what the teaching is have i understood it at this point many might say yeah i've understood what you're saying yes i get it some might say still not very clear then you have to repeat that verse you have to go through it and think about it again and again step by step and come to the point where it is clear i've understood it the crucial question is is it a fact is it real that i am the witness consciousness and everything the mind and body the world are all witnessed objects out there separate from me at this point most of us will say that sounds theoretical remember up to the first two stages eyes are the seer and the world is seen we felt it is a fact already a fact the eyes are seen the mind is the seer it's also a fact nothing to nothing to realize there but here when we come here people will object that it sounds like a theory it sounds like some clever philosophy it does not feel like a fact that i am pure consciousness and the mind and the body are drishya objects and that i am free of them i am aware i reveal the body i reveal the mind through the body mind i reveal the world i am just like pure light pure awareness yet vedanta insists it's absolutely a fact right now vedanta does not make it a fact vedanta only reveals seen vidant is knowledge the path of self inquiry will give us knowledge it will not create something new it will not generate something new it will not make me from the body into consciousness the i am already this consciousness and the path of self inquiry the yoga of self inquiry just reveals that knowledge can only reveal like light reveals things light does not create these objects knowledge reveals the state of affairs the master city the state of affairs is revealed by knowledge self-inquiry reveals that i am the self the seer i am awareness it does not make you into awareness now if we we we hesitate to say that honestly i feel i am pure consciousness i can sing with honesty i am not the mind not the intellect not the memory not even the ego interesting statement the ego i am not that means the ego is also a function of the mind this is actually the destruction of the ego this is the transcendence of the ego i realize i'm not the ego it's just a function of the mind now this we hesitate to say and one reason why we hesitate to say this is is given in the next last quarter we have this urge now that this possibility is there i am this pure consciousness what is it how can i experience it and alas the verse says this pure consciousness the witness itself the the ultimate seer that never becomes seen you cannot experience it as an object it is never an object and i said alas but it's actually good news if that becomes an object that pure consciousness becomes an object an object to whom an object to what that is ever the subject never the object it is ever the illuminati never the illuminated though i must say here it is not unknown it is self-luminous it reveals itself continuously it reveals itself and everything else see the light when the light falls on this table and reveals the book and the glasses and the you know the gadgets and all these things on the table and computer they're all revealed by the light they cannot reveal themselves they cannot reveal each other they cannot eliminate each other they are not luminous the light reveals all of them they cannot reveal the lighthouse because they are not luminous but the light does not require anything else to reveal itself the light which is shining it can reveal everything in the table and it reveals itself it reveals itself first it shines forth first self-luminous then reveals everything directly similarly this witness consciousness it never becomes an object you cannot objectify it but it is self-luminous it is shining forth all the time the reason why we find it we hesitate to say yes there is this pure consciousness and i am this pure consciousness now it is obvious to me thank you swami self-inquiry has worked i am now liberated i am of the nature of shiva why we hesitate is because we are only used to experiencing objects our entire structure of experience is objects things here are objects out there revealed by my eyes here are my eyes and my ears and my skin my sense organs revealed by the mind here are my thoughts revealed by consciousness but consciousness itself is revealed by what how is it an object of my experience it's not an object of my experience and therefore we miss it all the time we are unable to catch it we are unable to appreciate its existence and we hesitate to say that first of all whether such a thing is there at all and that i am that we hesitate to say it with any degree of confidence but it is with that which is always revealing everything else it's it's like um looking at them looking at your face in the mirror i can see my reflection or my image in the computer i can see my image in the computer now now if i see and look at my image in the computer and somebody tells me that's a reflection it's not your real face your real face is here i may doubt it i see i can see the reflection there i can see the image there that i can see and it's there i can see because i can say it exists because i see it but this real face you're talking about i can't see it how do i know it exists i know it exists because of the image the camera is capturing something and revealing it there because of that the eyes themselves they you say all these things in front of me exist because i can see it see the proof of existence is seeing i see it therefore it exists the problem is the eyes themselves i don't see it i don't see the eyes directly i can see it in a selfie i can see it in the mirror but directly the way the eyes see other objects i can't see them and therefore if i um if i say how do i know that the eyes exist the proof of existence is i must see them i can't see the eyes so how do i know that the eyes exist i know that the book exists because i see the book i know my hand exists because i see my hand i know that you exist because i see you how do i know by seeing what will i know that dies exist the answer is seeing anything that the eyes the function of the eyes is to reveal is to see the fact that you are seeing anything at all is a proof that you have eyes the seeing of anything reveals that your eyes their experience of anything in this universe reveals that you are consciousness consciousness is always shining forth so this indubitable consciousness which is always shining forth which is different from the the scene the objects of consciousness this is our real nature and knowing this we are free of the sufferings of material nature because sufferings are in the body and the mind which are grisha and objects the sufferings being there don't take don't misplace things what belongs to the body keep it in the body what belongs to the mind keep it in the mind don't take what belongs to the body and impose it upon yourself this is called abdyasa that which does not belong there in consciousness pain i am in pain no no wait wait for wait a minute i am the witness of the pain isn't it true then you must say i am not the pain i am aware of the pain i am free of the pain pain may come and go i am free of the pain i am anxious due to kovit due to problems in the world i am not anxious there is a feeling of anxiety in the mind about something and i eye the non-anxious never anxious awareness reveals that anxiety in the mind not the anxiety is not in consciousness okay so this consciousness what there's a beautiful verse about it the fifth one in this book which talks about the nature of this consciousness [Music] this consciousness like you know we see the sun rising and setting but when you go to the sun itself there's no rising and setting there's no day and night it's it's eternal day similarly consciousness it does not rise and set waking and dreaming and deep sleep you see those are not states of consciousness the states of the mind the mind wakes up and shines in consciousness the mind falls asleep and dreams in consciousness the mind goes to sleep and that is that sleep state is revealed by consciousness consciousness neither rises nor sets i am there's no more consciousness no less consciousness if i take a cup of coffee i feel more conscious no you feel more alert because the mind is now stimulated by that coffee this nerves are stimulated by that coffee it's not that consciousness is stimulated by coffee no video so um it is self-luminous like the light even the light is not self-luminous the light is revealed by these eyes the eyes are revealed by the mind and the mind is revealed by consciousness which is revealed by itself nothing but nothing else it is self-luminous swayam vibhati and it reveals everything else it reveals all the thoughts feelings emotions perceptions which are in the mind um without any instrument the mind needs the instrument of the senses to experience the world but even the senses need the instrument of the glasses to see better but consciousness does not need glasses consciousness does not need any instrument it directly reveals the mind through the mind reveals the body mind the body and the senses through the sensory system reveals the external world it's consciousness alone which reveals consciousness alone which shines and it illuminates the entire world one point then i'll stop and take questions all of this which i've said the path of self-inquiry it is uh at this point where i've isolated i the consciousness from the entire world of experienced objects including body body is now an object mind is also now an object thoughts are objects drastic viveka has been done this is not advaita vedanta truly speaking this is sankhya the ancient philosophy of discerning material nature from consciousness purusa and prakriti viveka this is what has been done this separation is certainly not non-duality non-duality is a step further one sadhu in uttarakhand said those who keep on talking about and rishi like we were doing till now they are unright veda is oneness oneness not this separation so how do we establish oneness now we can establish oneness we ask the question what is the relationship of the drishya to the dreshta the sadhu put it very nicely he said in hindi yes have you ever thought of are the scene different from the seer seer is different from the scene but are the scene different do they exist independently of the seer it's a strange question to ask but think about it when you say two things are separate the glasses and the book are separate you can see the glasses separately in the book separately but what about water and waves what about gold and the ornaments the waves are separate from the water in the sense that the water can exist or the well the water is separate from the waves the water can exist without the waves water can exist as calm water water can exist as water vapor water can exist as water in my glass but waves cannot exist apart from water waves are nothing but water ornaments are nothing but gold pottery is nothing but clay so in the same way the claim now is all that consciousness experiences all the objects are actually nothing but consciousness with a network of names and forms in other words we'll say little later universe is nothing but a network of names and forms spread over existence consciousness please spread over this consciousness so whatever we experience is actually not different from us we started with rashta and this year separate now we are merging the drishya back into the rashta we realize it is consciousness alone it is i alone who appear as my objects with the help of names and forms because these are not separate from me they do not constitute a countable second apart from me i am non-dual there is no real independent second second entity apart from consciousness therefore consciousness pure consciousness this witness consciousness is non-dual there is no independent second entity apart from neither consciousness therefore i am non-dual advayam brahma this is the meaning of chidanandarupaha shivoham i am of the nature of consciousness bliss of the nature of shiva who is nondual there is no countably separate second entity apart although the universe appears it appears in consciousness and indistinguishable from consciousness just the magic of names and forms conjured up by the inexplicable power of maya which seems to be a second second reality but it is not therefore advaita non-duality is established and that is the culmination of the path of self-inquiry i pray to srirama krishna the holy mother swami vivekananda on this wonderful day of international day of yoga that this highest yoga the yoga of self-inquiry it becomes fruitful luminous in our lives and our lives are blessed we realize who we truly are thank you very much thank you for giving me this opportunity i'm i think almost out of time there's some questions i think yes pranam maharaja thank you so much for your nice deliberation so we will repeat the questions that has been written by some participants in chat window so we will read out and we will request you to kindly answer so first question is from swami japan siddhanti maharaj i'm sorry the first question is from uh pradeep banerjee if we are not the body and the mind then who is perceiving and feeling also who is dreaming if they are not the body and the mind who is perceiving and feeling you are obviously you are perceiving and feeling because you claim i see i uh smell i touch i am awake i dreamt so you are the question is what is the nature of the you uh is it the body is it the just the body which dreams and um which sees and hears then the dead body also can see and hear you say no it is the living body the living body also can see and here if your mind is falling asleep suppose you are given an injection and put into anesthesia and in deep anesthesia body is a living body can it see can it hear can it smell and taste and touch no so it is actually awareness which is seeing hearing smelling tasting touching there is no other seer in this body and mind apart from awareness there is no other hearer smeller taster toucher there is no other thinker no other one who remembers except awareness itself so awareness is that which is doing everything through the body and mind so the instrumentality of the body and mind mars the next question is from joydeep he asks how can one experience the awareness in oneself is there any specific practice you can suggest are you not experiencing awareness in yourself right now what practice so joy dip tell me what practice do you need to become joy deep you are jaydeep i'm asking you what are the practices that you do daily morning evening afternoon what yogic practices do you do to become joy deep you say nothing i enjoyed it effortlessly enjoyed it are you not aware effortlessly what ex exercises are you doing to be be aware nothing the whole point is this we are already awareness we just do not recognize what we already have we get this feeling is something extraordinary is being talked about sri ramakrishna talked about the washer man who discovered a diamond he did not know it was a diamond he used it to scrub clothes but luckily he had a friend a vegetable seller to whom he took the stone it's a strange stone it's not like other stones can you tell me what is it the vegetable seller said i don't know really but it seems to be something valuable i can give you so much of brinjals for it give it to me luckily the washer man did not sell the diamond finally he went to his friend who is a diamond merchant and who said it's the most extraordinary diamond i've seen i'll give you 10 crore rupees for it and all the wants of the washer man were removed the diamond which he always had he was just using it for scrubbing we have the diamond which is pure awareness immortal consciousness the chidananda rupa shivoham and we are using it how are we using it we are using it for seeing and hearing and smelling and tasting and touching we are using it for thinking for loving hating suffering and listening to seminars and webinars we are using the same thing the diamond is there we don't recognize what we have maharaja the next question is from tahina she is asking how to realize the subtle self within us which is not the body the subtle self sukshma if you i understand what you want to say but the question if you look at it the way it's phrased phrased how do you realize the subtle self so what is the gross self the physical self physical self is the body the how do you realize it don't have to realize it it's obvious what is the subtle self then it is the mind your mind your thoughts feelings what is there to realize you are always experiencing it what you mean is what was taught just now the witness consciousness how to realize that the fact is it is always there it is always shining food but it's not helpful to talk like that therefore what vedanta does is it comes down to our level and says that yes you don't think that you are this witness consciousness then let us take it step by step say what you are tell me what you are point to what you are we'll point to the body then vedanta shows us how we are not the body actually the body is there but we are aware of the body something inside annual atma pranamaya something inside which enlivens the body it takes us to the prana then we experience the prana we think are you the prana but you are the experiencer of the prana and anu antarath step by step from the body to the prana to the mind to the intellect to something beyond that did you see how we moved here from the external world and the sensory system this is the stool the growth the physical we move from that to thoughts the mind drift to manasam the subtle world and from there we skipped the causal part of it we jumped to the witness consciousness so always what vedanta does is it helps us to move from the physical to the subtle to the causal that is technical point and to the witness of the causal subtle physical and after that it merges these three back merges means you realize what you called causal and subtle and physical are actually not apart from you thank you maras the last question is from diksanth he is asking how do i break the distinction between my spiritual life and my work life and find out all what i do is spiritual that's a very good question and the answer will be different for each of the yogas so for karma yoga most powerful way of breaking the distinction between this false dichotomy between the sacred and the secular karma yoga is transformation of all our actions into spiritual practice so your work life your life in the community your life in the family they can all be seen as puja as worship of the divine now there is no distinction between what you do in your temple in your meditation room in vedanta class and what you do in your office in your school in your in your family all of it can become spiritual practice that's from the perspective of karma yoga from the perspective of bhakti yoga the difference between low kika and vaidhika that means there's some practice which i consider religious but the same god whom i worship in the temple and the prayer room is there in every living being in every activity are they separate from god so i'm worshiping god whether i'm in my prayer room or in my secular activity in the path of yoga this is little difficult in the path of raja yoga where the practice itself is to cut out everything else and actually during the practice of raja yoga you cannot involve yourself in activities asi no sambhavat it is possible when you sit down quietly separate from the early burley of the world but with the increased concentration the focus which you get from raja yoga it becomes very useful in day to day life and in in the path of self inquiry the distinction between the secular and the sacred is lost entirely this consciousness which you are inquiring into is available continuously see in the yogic patanjali yoga method of meditation you have to close your eyes and sit and meditate but in vedantic needed hassan you can close your eyes and sit and meditate you can open your eyes brahmapanam brahmavi that in your activities throughout the day you can see all action you know as the cosmic yagya you can see the all action as a worship or as a manifestation of consciousness that means the one who is who sees brahman in every action that one attains to brahman that means if your eyes are open you know you are acting whether you are doing some kind of spiritual activity some kind of ritual or in the office or in the school everything is a play of that one consciousness you realize that and that is possible in the path of non-dualism yes there is a question from one of our professors he is a neuroscientist and he has asked a very nice question we will read it out yes is his name his name is dr arkadee datta he is a professor in our yoga department and he is a specialist in neuroscience yes his question is is witness consciousness just confined to the subtle components of the self or can it connect and influence many minds as a symbol of a subject eternal the second one it is not confined to the mind rather the mind appears in consciousness mind senses and body in the bhagavad-gita 13th chapter sri krishna says in the terminology used by dr dhakta it is that one witness consciousness the one subject eternal which is illumining all the fields that means the minds and bodies consider it this way it's nothing very remarkable i am aware i feel awareness in myself and drigrishya viveka shows me this awareness is the witness of this body and mind we get the intuition then so many bodies there must be so many minds there must be so many consciousnesses witnesses but no bodies you can distinguish you can count you can easily count how many there are even this zoom is counting how many participants there are and so on you can count the minds also if you take a questionnaire and ask people with their opinions which are whom are you voting for trump or biden you will get so many opinions which means minds are different but distinguished from the minds and the bodies the consciousness itself the witness consciousness itself how will you distinguish sankhya it's a very deep question sankhya says there are many witness consciousnesses there are many purusas but vedantas the question on what basis are you distinguishing these purushas on what basis are you distinguishing the witness consciousness and the sankhya's replies are interesting sankhya says that no there must be many consciousnesses because if consciousness was one then the birth of one person would be the birth of everybody the death of one person would be the death of everybody but that's not true the birth is the birth of the body the death is the death of the body the death of one body does not mean the death of other bodies another objection would be no if we are one consciousness then um what about um you know when one person is awake all would be awake when one person is asleep all would be asleep but that is waking in a way a sleeping of the mind same consciousness in the waking mind it shows the mind is awake in the one who is sleeping the same consciousness shines on the sleeping mind so consciousness you cannot distinguish distinguishes are based on the body and the mind so it is one witness consciousness in all bodies and minds but this is still pretty far from what modern consciousness studies is doing right now um dr doctor will be aware still the majority effort is to try to reduce uh consciousness to its neural correlates the activity in the brain that's because of the prevailing scientific paradigm of reductionism yes so thank you server-priyanadaji for your very interesting simple talk making yoga and inquiry is so simple and doable by everybody that was swami vivekananda's take on this he said i can teach advaitha even to your child because it is your real nature it's you and the operation also says the priyatwa the dearness of something is the dearest is the atman which is yourself and hope your lecture and your talk and your simple delivery with a passion will inspire the listeners to inquire into themselves and not get caught in the humdrum of existence which is too noisy and listen to the music of their own inner soul thank you so much [Music] for yes please accept pranams yeah and i want to thank all the organizers for this wonderful program i've been participating in some of the other programs i listened to some of the talks uh the last two three days yeah so tomorrow's program you announced so thank you for uh participating everybody tomorrow we have a talk by swami atma gyananda who is the minister in charge of the vedanta center of greater washington the topic is the transforming power of prayer in bhakti yoga we welcome all of you to attend so we will have bhakti for the change and swami atma is an american monk who did his phd in calcutta university on caitanya mahaprabhu so he is a specialist in bhakti just as swami sarvapriyan the specialist in ghana so we'll be very happy if all of you participate interact and get benefited through swami at began on this talk tomorrow and the power of prayer which is so necessary for everybody now people are distressed how prayer can help and what is the place of prayer and what power prayer actually is thank you

Channel: Vedanta New York

Views: 117,955

Keywords: vedantany, vedanta society of new york, sarvapriyananda, swami sarvapriyananda, sarvapriyananda lectures, swami vivekananda, vivekananda, vivekananda teachings, vedanta ny, vedanta, vedanta lectures, belur math, jnana yoga, hinduism, spirituality, enlightenment, higher consciousness, meditation, mindfulness, realization, consciousness, moksha, nirvana

Id: HskaWS0C3vU

Length: 71min 48sec (4308 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 30 2021