Very fine topic above religious beliefs and everyone's necessity pleasing to hear all other lectures too Ramana Maharshi's noble magnum opus dreamwork honestly calming serving lifetime too
Super text needs sufficient time to digest grasping fully with lifetime experiences too leaving behind the question remain always to begin search what 'I' am' again
Salutations to Madam Veena Bannanje, I am an ardent fan of yours. I have translated some of your inspiring stories into English like 'Krishna Sandhana', 'Sahara' in my FB blog under my same name.With your kind permission taken for granted, may I kindly say a few words I have learnt from Bhagawan Ramana's teachings? Not to be mistaken for any arrogance but a humble submission. Bhagawan suggests a very simple revolutionary technic (actually an Upanishad input) to unravel the 'I' factor (nanu yaru) - here it goes.'Who Am I' (some voice) asking this question to another (imaginary but ITSELF ! )that is behind the eyes seeing, that is smelling & breathing thru' the nostrils, that is tasting, chewing & swallowing food to nourish the body & speaking thru' the mouth, that is feeling through the skin of these hands, that is moving the body thru' the feet of these legs, that has created the body itself, operating, monitoring & maintaining it throughout its lifespan & who that is dwelling in it to EXPRESS & EXPERIENCE itself, & who that is EXPLAINING all this phenomenon to WHOM if not itself the SILENT WITNESS of all that is 'happening'. So where am I ? The answer(a non-entity) A VENTRILOQUIST holding dolls in his hands & pretending to be speaking in a double voice. Here are some more interesting points to ponder. 'I AM' is not the body & mind because the 'I' does not identify with anyone - Let us examine. When I say My Car' / My House / My wife /My Son etc. it means Me + car, house, wife, etc being separate. So here also when we say 'My body, My mind' Me + body 'Me + mind. So This ' I ' or ME does not identify with anything (one may try), Then who is this 'I" that is the single ENTITY humming in all universally?. It is the Divine Creator itself (no gender here) which is making its presence known in all animate & inanimate things(science has proved even a stone is alive). It is the eternal primordial energy, the Pranava. 'I am ' is not a thought, since thoughts come & go & change their structure every miro second, but I AM is a CONSTANT note humming from our first breath till the last breath. That is why Maharshi Ramana said 'I am' unborn & eternal Consciousness which we experience in the waking stage, in sleep, dream & deep sleep. When we are asleep, our mind is also sleeping, but when we get up in the morning we remember both sleep & dream by saying 'O' what a wonderful sleep I had & what a good or dream I had. It is Consciousness as 'I' that is present all the time, during the waking, sleep & dream states - This 'Universal I feeling lasts only for a few seconds as soon as we get up from sleep. The next moment, the clever mind(EGO) fearing for its survival quickly superimposes itself on the Real 'I' taking control of the person & the whole drama unfolds, as Bhagawan Ramana has explained. So he advises in order to at†ain liberation, to focus continuously on the source of the 'I' factor when that too disappears into the vortex of CONSCIOUSNESS (Hiranya Garbha) & the individual soul merges into it fully liberated.Papaji(Harivamshlal Poonja, nephew of Swami Rama Theertha, a disciple of Ramana & his disciple, Mooji(a native of West Indies) & Beedi Baba-Nisargadatta Maharaj, an illiterate beedi merchant who lived in a slum in the Bombay suburbs also attained salvation finding out the source of 'I' only. Nisargadatta attracted many disciples from the west & spoke only in Marathi, his native language. Raman Balsekar, the Chairman of Bank of India acted as his interpreter & later he too got realized. Mooji baba(Papaji Poonja's disciple) is now conducting Satsanghs in Rishikesh, Tiruvannamalai & a few places in Europe. Nisargadatta's Guru was Siddarameshwar Maharaj, a Lingayat saint from Karnataka, who asked him to observe himself in silence ('I am' ness -without words & Maharaj declares that within 3 yrs at the age of 45, he attained what the Maverick Philosopher UG called 'the Natural State' of all. Beedi Baba as he was called, has authored a book 'I am That'. Nisargadatta was also a devotee of Bhagawan Nityananda of Ganeshpuri & Ramana Maharshi(though not met him unlike Papaji) Please Google & watch KEN WILBUR's 'I Am' video 8 mts. duration P.S. 'AYAM TAT ' (Sanskrit) WhIch in English ' I AM THAT' same in sound & meaning. Bhagawan tells the intellectual lot 'what is the use of knowing so many things when one does not know himself?' -All this tinsel knowledge we know needs to be wiped out from the mind & with a clean slate (unknowing), we have to start, he asserts'.He further states, 'there is no such thing as Self Realization as the Self is already in the realized state. Only it needs to be 'discovered' by removing the curtain. To a question 'Does it help others' he laughed & said ' there is no other for a Jnani after knowing the Self as he sees himSelf in all' !!!