Sri Ramana on self realisation

Sri Ramana Maharshi was one of India’s tallest sages.

He was widely viewed as an incarnation of Lord Subramanya and espoused the path of self enquiry as a means to self realisation were practical, personal and direct.
This method was not an intellectual exercise but a combination of karma yoga (working for others) and jnana yoga (working for oneself).

He would often say: “All men are realised. Everyone is already realised and ever realised.
“One thinks one is bound because one mistakes the body for the self which is infinite, pure awareness.

“What we call realisation consists in getting rid of the wrong idea that one is not realised. Realisation is not something to be got anew. It is merely the elimination of ignorance.”

In his view, realising the self is nothing but letting go of the non-self. He used to call religion “a great game of pretending.”

As he expressed it: “The aim of all religions is to take us back to our pristine state of being-awareness-bliss. To teach this simple truth, so many schools, books, creeds and methods have come into being because people want complexity.

“They want elaborate and puzzling things that give rise to dispute.”
“The Kingdom of Heaven is within you, within your grasp, right in your midst. This is the simple truth. But only a mature mind can grasp it in its nakedness.

Instead of being and behaving as the self and beginning a new life, people want to know all about heaven, hell, reincarnation and other mysteries and the so-called religions pamper them.”

“After all these wanderings you must return only to the self. Then why not abide in the self right here and now? Leave this verbiage and be as you are.

“See who you are and remain in the self as awareness, free from birth, coming, going and returning. Why so many efforts and so much discipline to eradicate this illusory avidya or ignorance”

He would say that a person who remembers “the “I” within the heart is not concerned with questions of right and wrong. His actions are God’s and therefore are always right.”
As Carl Jung said: “What we find in the life and teachings of Sri Ramana is the purest of India with its breath of world liberated and liberating humanity, it is a chant of millenniums.

The melody is built up on a single great motif which in a thousand colourful reflexes, rejuvenates itself within the Indian spirit and the latest incarnation of which is Sri Ramana Maharishi himself.”