Meditations With Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
Highlights
Nirupana 5 – Sunday, December 25, 1977
The highest religion means to live with the conviction that we are pure consciousness. Liberation means to be free. Then one is not affected by the bondage of mind, intellect and ego. One who follows this gets freedom from all concepts. Only the religion of one’s own Self will last to the end. That through which worldly dealings are known is our true nature. Though fully immersed in mundane activity, one is not affected. Understand this fact, be silent and at peace. All your needs will be taken care of.
Nirupana 5 – Sunday, December 25, 1977
Spiritual effort is as easy as it is difficult. One who holds onto the Guru’s word that ‘I am the self-luminous Atman’ will find it easy.
Nirupana 7 – Sunday, January 15, 1978
Death is only a word. It is never an experience. What will you experience other than Brahman when there is nothing else other than Brahman? You have become the disciple of the mind. Mind is designing you. Mind does not know its source. Your conviction should rest in the Guru’s word. ‘Guru initiated me’ means he told me about my true nature. Believing it to be true, if one behaves with conviction, then the Truth will be known. From other people’s point of view, a man is dead. From the point of view of a jnani, he has become free of his delusion. ‘I am such and such, a woman or a man’, is the delusion.
Nirupana 8 – Thursday, January 19, 1978
The body is prakriti (nature) and the one who resides in the body is Purusha (Self). The one who acts is prakriti, while the Purusha is the passive witness. In other words, prana is the movement and its knower is consciousness. Both the energies have no form. Prakriti and Purusha are not separate. So long as you take yourself as the body, there is no peace. Keep in mind what you have heard and discriminate constantly. One who has realized prakriti and Purusha becomes liberated.
Nirupana 8 – Thursday, January 19, 1978
One who knows the power of prana is a jnani. His meditation continues all through the day. Concentrate on the source of the vital energy (shakti). This meditation is carried out with that energy. Everlasting peace is the great accomplishment. When both prakriti and Purusha are forgotten, there is real rest. By virtue of meditation, the feeling ‘I am so-and-so’ is lost. To make meditation successful, be faithful to it. Concentrate on the Self with the energy of prana. When this energy is arrested, the consciousness becomes one with it and samadhi ensues
Nirupana 9 – Sunday, January 22, 1978
Live a life without expectations. Then, automatically, the attachments will fall off. Recognize that you are without requirements. Your true state is spontaneously there. Do not disturb it through the mind.
Nirupana 9 – Sunday, January 22, 1978
Worldly dealings are not under your control. They will keep on going. Once you are stabilized in your Self, you will never feel a want of anything.
Nirupana 9 – Sunday, January 22, 1978
the awareness that ‘you are’. What is the relationship of this knowledge to you? Does it die when the five-elemental body ceases to be? Think of how you would appear if you were not the body. Keeping in mind what you have heard and pondering over it is the greatest penance. Through the practice of this kind of meditation, you will go on changing continuously and you will reach a stage where there is no further change.
Nirupana 9 – Sunday, January 22, 1978
The Truth has no knowledge of Itself (it is unmanifest). Attend to this goal constantly. Drive away body-consciousness from your mind. No matter how much you insist, you cannot be a man or a woman forever.
Nirupana 9 – Sunday, January 22, 1978
You cannot bear your consciousness without having something else to think over. To meditate on the Self is possible only with the grace of the Guru. Such meditation is unique, not commonly found in the world.
Nirupana 10 – Sunday, January 29, 1978
The one who has realized his own consciousness, its cause and its duration, is the knower. He does not act. When the king is seated on the throne, the administration goes on, just because he is. Similarly, the knower does not act.
Nirupana 10 – Sunday, January 29, 1978
The knower is beyond the known. (The knower means the supreme Self or the Paramatman who is prior to consciousness.) It is the unmanifested state
Nirupana 10 – Sunday, January 29, 1978
The ignorant person takes the feeling ‘I am’ as the body, the seeker takes it as pure consciousness, but the jnani does not identify with anything.
Nirupana 10 – Sunday, January 29, 1978
One who has realized this state is called a jnani
Nirupana 10 – Sunday, January 29, 1978
Because of ignorance one apparently enjoys body-consciousness. A seeker enjoys it as knowledge. The knower is beyond knowledge. A realized soul is beyond that enjoyment altogether.
Nirupana 10 – Sunday, January 29, 1978
there is one remedy available to you. Chant your mantra. With faith in the one who has given you the mantra, your consciousness will become stronger. As a result, there will be no weakness in your actions. The greater the faith in the Guru, the earlier the success. If you take your Guru as a human being, your consciousness will harass you. One who follows this faithfully will enjoy liberation in this very body. To surrender means to be without body-consciousness. To offer everything to Brahman means to be without quality. Act with the conviction that the consciousness that sustains the universe is within your body. On your own, you are unable to do anything. All the actions are carried out by the life force. The Guru introduces you to consciousness.
Because of your presence (the pure consciousness) the places of your pilgrimage become holy. There is nothing more sacred than consciousness. When you realize your Self, there will be nothing as holy as you. When you get this conviction, there will be no need for associating with others. One who has pride of his (so-called) enlightenment is ignorant. How can one have any pride when he realizes that nothing has happened?
Love implies our need for beingness. Love is infinite and unlimited. It is consciousness that has arisen in us unknowingly. It is without shape, caste or creed. It is the pure quality of the vital energy. It is the power of this love by which we feel that ‘we are’.
Nirupana 10 – Sunday, January 29, 1978
Be loyal to the Sadguru. Do not impose your body-consciousness on Him. After recognizing the seed-consciousness, everything becomes an offering to Brahman.
Nirupana 10 – Sunday, January 29, 1978
My Guru used to say no matter how old you are, you are only a child. (The body gets older. Yet consciousness is always in the present moment. It is like a newborn child at all times.)
Nirupana 11 – Thursday, February 9, 1978
Concepts and desires appear with the body, and also disappear with the body. All that is known is a concept. However great the knower of the Self may be, what he teaches is still a concept that pleases him.
Nirupana 11 – Thursday, February 9, 1978
Put aside what you have learnt from books. As long as you think you are separate, you have to do sadhana (spiritual practice). Whatever happens or does not happen is within God, and by God. You are not concerned with that. To keep this awareness throughout the day is constant meditation on the Self.
Nirupana 11 – Thursday, February 9, 1978
Consciousness as ‘I am’ is atomic. The moment it comes into being, it becomes self-luminous and creates the immense world. How can you put an end to the things that have been created by your own light?
Nirupana 12 – Thursday, February 16, 1978
As long as you look for personal benefit, you will not get Self-realization
Nirupana 12 – Thursday, February 16, 1978
The body has a form but consciousness within the body has no form. By taking the body as our form, duality is created
Nirupana 12 – Thursday, February 16, 1978
Worship only consciousness by which all of this is experienced. It is beyond intellect.
Nirupana 12 – Thursday, February 16, 1978
Consciousness is the hum of beingness. To catch hold of it is meditation
Nirupana 12 – Thursday, February 16, 1978
People say they are happy, but has anyone of them experienced bliss? Our true nature is neither happiness nor sorrow. The Self, itself, is happiness.
Nirupana 12 – Thursday, February 16, 1978
It is fearless just as space is fearless. It is stupendous and fathomless. Keep your attention on It. Worship It without bringing in duality. Do not identify with the body. You are the ocean of bliss.
In summary, worship the word of the Guru, ‘I am not the body, I am the formless, pure life force or Brahman that vitalizes the body’.
Nirupana 136 – Thursday, October 11, 1979
Can consciousness belong to an individual (who through ignorance considers himself as the body)? It only belongs to God who is Infinite. So it is best to keep quiet.
Nirupana 139 – Thursday, November 8, 1979
Believing ‘the body is me’ gives rise to all misery through hopes, desires and passions.
Nirupana 140 – Sunday, November 11, 1979
If an important person were introduced to an ordinary man, the latter would have some expectations of him. A jnani has no such desire for anything from anyone. What is a jnani? He is nothingness. He has no name, no form, nothing at all.
Nirupana 140 – Sunday, November 11, 1979
Someone earns a lot of money (in the city), goes back to his village and builds a house. He dies after the ritual of entering the new house. He has no heir, so it goes to the Government. Maya is like that. It does not mean that one should not act at all. But what is the future of that action, and what is the future of such a person? This has to be understood properly. We cannot be of any use to ourselves. The jnani knows this.
Nirupana 140 – Sunday, November 11, 1979
In the physical world if there is competition, a man gets some inspiration to live by. With this kind of talk, there will be no charm in living. A jnani does not usually talk because he takes away people’s ambitions
Nirupana 140 – Sunday, November 11, 1979
Detachment means understanding that everything is in vain. Charity and love are naturally there. It is the nature of consciousness. It is not that you do it.
Nirupana 140 – Sunday, November 11, 1979
This is your natural state – rarely will anyone tell you about this. Most teachers will ask you to do something. They will not tell you that whatever effort one makes is meaningless.