Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
Quotes
A prominent teacher of Advaita Vedanta who is best known for his teachings on non-duality and self-realization. His approach was direct and experiential, encouraging seekers to explore the nature of their own consciousness. His book, "I Am That," is a significant text in the study of Advaita Vedanta, offering profound insights into the nature of the self and reality. His teachings are valued for their simplicity and depth, guiding individuals toward understanding their true essence beyond the mind and ego.
In peace and silence, the skin of the 'I' dissolves and the inner and the outer become one.
You are really in search of yourself, without knowing it. You are love-longing for the love-worthy, the perfect lovable. Due to ignorance you are looking for it in the world of opposites and contradictions. When you find it within, your search will be over.
We are slaves of what we don't know; of what we know we are masters. Whatever vice or weakness in ourselves we discover and understand its cause and workings, we overcome it by the very knowing. The primary purpose of meditation is to become more conscious and familiar with our inner life. The ultimate purpose is to reach the source of life.
Meet your own self. Be with your own self, listen to it, obey it, cherish it, keep it in mind ceaselessly. You need no other guide.
There are always moments when one feels empty and estranged. Such moments are most desirable, for it means the soul has cast its moorings and is sailing for distant places. This is detachment -- when the old is over and the new has not yet come. If you are afraid, the state may be distressing, but there is really nothing to be afraid of. Remember the instruction: Whatever you come across -- go beyond.
The world is like a sheet of paper on which something is typed. The reading and the meaning will vary with the reader, but the paper is the common factor, always present, rarely perceived. When the ribbon is removed, typing leaves no trace on the paper. So is my mind - the impressions keep on coming, but no trace is left.
Stop, look, investigate, ask the right questions, come to the right conclusions and have the courage to act on them and see what happens. The first steps may bring the roof down on your head, but soon the commotion will clear and there will be peace and joy.
Suffering is primarily a call for attention, which itself is a movement of love. More than happiness, love wants growth, the widening and deepening of awareness and consciousness and being. Whatever prevents that, becomes a cause of pain, and love does not shirk from pain.
See that you are not what you believe yourself to be. Fight with all the strength at your disposal against the idea that you are nameable and describable. You are not. Refuse to think of this or that. There is no other way out of misery, which you have created for yourself through blind acceptance without investigation. Suffering is a call for inquiry, all pain needs investigation. Don't be lazy to think.
In the light of calm and steady self-awareness, inner energies wake up and work miracles without any effort on your part.
When you believe yourself to be a person, you see persons everywhere. In reality there are no persons, only threads of memories and habits. At the moment of realisation the person ceases.
Give your real being a chance to shape your life. You will not regret it.
Awareness is ever there. It need not be realized. Open the shutter of the mind, and it will be flooded with light.
In reality there are no others, and -helping yourself you help everybody else.
Nature is neither pleasant nor painful. It is all intelligence and beauty. Pain and pleasure are in the mind.
Sadhana is a search for what to give up. Empty yourself completely.
Even faith in God is only a stage on the way. Ultimately you abandon all, for you come to something so simple that there are no words to express it.
Learn to look without imagination, to listen without distortion: that is all. Stop attributing names and shapes to the essentially nameless and formless, realize that every mode of perception is subjective, that what is seen or heard, touched or smelled, felt or thought, expected or imagined, is in the mind and not in reality, and you will experience peace and freedom from fear.
All you need is to stop searching outside for what can be found only within. Set your vision right before you operate. You are suffering from acute misapprehension. Clarify your mind, purify your heart, sanctify your life - this is the quickest way to a change in your world.
Come to the conclusion: I am unborn, I was unborn and I shall remain unborn.
Life is love and love is life.
Whatever can be understood or perceived can never be the eternal Truth. The Unknown is the Truth.
When you know beyond all doubting that the same life flows through all that is, and you are that life, you will love all naturally and spontaneously.
