Quotes About Awareness

Controlling speech and breath, and diving deep within oneself — like one who, to find a thing that has fallen into water, dives deep down — one must seek out the source whence the aspiring ego springs.

When the pot is carried, the space within the pot, Though conceived of as carried, Is it not the pot only that is carried? The Self too, like Space, remains motionless. 53. When the pot breaks, the space in the pot Merges one with the great Space. When the inert body passes away, the Self, seemingly in the body, Becomes immediately one with the Supreme Self.

The question 'Who am I?' is not really meant to get an answer, the question 'Who am I?' is meant to dissolve the questioner.

when there is no 'I' there is no karma.

Whatever draws the mind outward is unspiritual and whatever draws the mind inward is spiritual

When the mind that is subtle goes out through the brain and the sense-organs, the gross names and forms appear; when it stays in the Heart, the names and forms disappear.

Let come what comes, Let go what goes, See what remains.

The reply comes as a current of awareness in the Heart, fitful at first and only achieved by intense effort, but gradually increasing in power and constancy, becoming more spontaneous, acting as a check on thoughts and actions, undermining the ego, until finally the ego disappears and the certitude of pure Consciousness remains.

Thoughts of bondage and of freedom last only as long as one feels, 'I am bound'. When one enquires of oneself, 'Who am I, the bound one?' the Self, Eternal, ever free, remains. The thought of bondage goes; and with it goes the thought of freedom too.

He who has renounced (the 'I-thought') thus, remains the same whether he is alone or in the midst of the extensive samsara

Silence is also conversation.

If the light of the sun is invisible to the owl it is only the fault of that bird and not of the sun.

It is beyond words or thoughts.

How is breath control the means for mind control? M: There is no doubt that breath control is the means for mind control, because the mind, like breath, is a part of air, because the nature of mobility is common to both, because the place of origin is the same for both, and because when one of them is controlled the other gets controlled.

A dreamer dreams that everyone else in his dream must awaken before he can awaken.

One can know oneself only with one's own eye of knowledge, and not with somebody else's. Does he who is Rama require the help of a mirror to know that he is Rama?

Engage yourself in the living present. The future will take care of itself. Do not worry about the future. (p. 154)

The body which is matter says not 'I'. Eternal Awareness rises not nor sets. Betwixt the two, bound by the body, rises the thought of 'I'. This is the knot of matter and Awareness. This is bondage, jiva, subtle body, ego. This is samsara, this is the mind.

The Self is the only Reality. (p. 38)

Be as you are. (p. 118)

What the mind has to do is not to suggest a reply, but to remain quiet so that the true reply can arise.

All that is needed is that you give up your realisation of the not-true as true.

Ramana Maharshi's advice on depression) This depression must be traced to its origin. The origin is the wrong identification of the body with the Self. The disease is not of the Self. It is of the body. But the body does not come and tell you that it is possessed by the disease. It is you who say so. Why? Because you have wrongly identified yourself with the body. The body itself is a thought. Be as you really are. There is no reason to be depressed. (p. 360)

I Am is the name of God. Of all the definitions of God, none is indeed so well put as the Biblical statement "I Am that I Am" in Exodus (chap. 3). There are other statements, such as Brahmaivaham, Aham Brahmasmi, and Soham. But none is so direct as the name Jehovah = I Am. The Absolute Being is what is – it is the Self. It is God. Knowing the Self, God is known. In fact, God is none other than the Self. (p. 76)