radams@cerritos.edu (05/18/91)
What I like about Sri Ramana Maharshi's teachings is that he emphasizes that
the freedom from suffering that we are seeking is not something which is
external to us. If it were external, and we had to gain it or acquire it,
then it only follows that we can loose it again (there are some people that
talk of becoming 'saved' then in the next breath talk about 'backsliding')
because it does not originally belong to us and is foreign to us. Sri
Ramana Maharshi and other great ones say that Samadhi, or freedom from
suffering, or enlightenment, whatever you want to call it, is our natural
state and that we our only dreaming that we are not in this state. If
this Samadhi or Self-realization is our natural state of the Self within,
then we do not need to go out on a safari in search for it, it is already
ours. Jesus referred to this state of Being as the kingdom of God and said
that it is within us and not something that we can say 'lo here' or 'lo there'.
If we already have this Self, it does not need to be found because it is not
lost. Ramana Maharshi once said that it is the very thinking that we are
in delusion and separate from the Self that is the problem. Find out who
is thinking these thoughts and trace this since of 'I' back to its Source
- he referred to this as self-enquiry or Atma-vichara. Maharshi was once
asked about meditation compared to self-enquiry and he said that meditation
eliminates the not-Self or un-Self and what remains is the pure SELF.
Now for those of you in this newsgroup who send me messages complaining
about me talking about things which I have read and probably have not
experienced, and that what one reads is of no use since you have to discard
it later anyway, let me say that what one reads can inspire one to continue
experiencing. Furthermore, the experiencing tends to be beyond words anyway
so if we all took your advice, this newsgroup would be inactive and silent
without any postings since we can't express the transcendental in words.
There is the old Buddhist saying that "he who speaks does not know, and he
who knows does not speak". However, I think that writing helps one to digest
what he or she reads (I don't want intellectual indigestion) so I ask others
to indulge me occasionally. Besides, I don't just read, I do practice
meditation and other practices which increase ones ability to learn from
the great ones and their teachings and to benefit from them.
Roger Adams
radams@cerritos.edu To those in whom love dwells,
Cerritos College the whole world is one family.
11110 Alondra Blvd A Hindu Proverb
Norwalk, California 90650
USA
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