Rest in consciousness by recognizing it as the Self, which is God in truth.
One does not find a reflection of his self when he is standing in front of a mirror, but he finds his body and the background world in the mirror. The one that is conscious of the body and the experience of the world is not the body but the invisible Soul, the Self, which is present in the form of consciousness.
The relationship and love, hate, happiness, and misery of the practical life within the practical world are not connected to the invisible Soul, which is the real Self. The real Self is beyond form, time, and space and beyond birth, life, death, and world.
Thus rest in consciousness by recognizing the Self is not you but the invisible Soul, the Self, which is God in truth.
Realize that the practical life within the practical world is merely an illusion created out of consciousness. Consciousness is the ultimate truth, and the ultimate truth is God or God in truth.
Getting rid of the physical shackle is necessary to overcome the burden and bondage of the illusory samsara.
Love and relationships seem real in practical life within the practical world, but they are merely an illusion from the ultimate standpoint. Thus, the game of life is merely a passing show.
It is not possible to get rid of ignorance through religious or yogic paths.
Katha Upanishad 1:2:23- The Soul cannot be realized through hearing a scholarly explanation of the discourses, not even by the intellect.
Katha Upanishad 1:3:6- “Through the knowledge of the Soul, God, one is pure and clean constantly.” Neither by reading the book, nor by taking a bath at a holy place, has one become pure. Inner purity is possible when one remains in constant touch with the Soul. Constant Soul-Consciousness is the real purity.
Kena Upanishad 2:4- When it is known through every state of cognition, it is rightly known, for (by such knowledge) one attains life eternal. Through one's own self, one gains power, and through wisdom, one gains immortality.
Kena Upanishad 2:5- If here one knows it, then there is truth, and if here one knows it not, there is a great loss. Hence, seeing the Real in all beings, wise men become immortal on departing from this world.
Mundaka Upanishad 1:2:8- “Remaining in the fold of ignorance and thinking 'we are extremely wise and learned,' the fools with boastful nature ramble about like the blind led by the blind alone.”
Mundaka Upanishad 3:2:3-“The weak and timid cannot realize the Self. Self-realization is not possible through intellect or hearing spiritual discourse. One who welcomes God in every activity, through a thoroughly controlled and disciplined life, to him also the Soul is revealed."
Mundaka Upanishad 3:2:3- The Soul cannot be realized by the weak and timid.
That is why Sage Sankara says in Viveka Chudamani:- 56. Neither by Yoga, nor by Sankhya, nor by work, nor by learning, but by the realization of one's identity with Brahman is Liberation possible, and by no other means.
58. Loud speech consisting of a shower of words, the skill in expounding the Scriptures, and likewise erudition - these merely bring on a little personal enjoyment to the scholar but are no good for Liberation.
59. The study of the Scriptures is useless so long as the highest Truth is unknown, and it is equally useless when the highest Truth has already been known.
60. The Scriptures, consisting of many words, are a dense forest that merely causes the mind to ramble. Hence, the men of wisdom should earnestly set about knowing the true nature of the Self.
61. For one who has been bitten by the serpent of Ignorance, the only remedy is the knowledge of Brahman. Of what avail are the Vedas and (other) Scriptures, Mantras (sacred formulae), and medicines to such a one?
62. A disease does not leave off if one simply utters the name of the medicine, without taking it; (similarly) without direct realization, one cannot be liberated by the mere utterance of the word Brahman.
63. Without causing the objective universe to vanish and without knowing the truth of the Self, how is one to achieve Liberation by the mere utterance of the word Brahman? — It would result merely in an effort of speech.
64. Without killing one’s enemies and possessing oneself of the splendor of the entire surrounding region, one cannot claim to be an emperor by merely saying, ‘I am an emperor’.
Until one knows the truth of his true existence, whatever he knows about god is mere belief. Belief is individual, whereas the ultimate truth is universal. Every belief system has its own idea of god, thus there is no universality in the belief system.
The invisible Soul, the Self, is neither the five elements, nor any of the organs individually, nor all the elements or organs together as a whole. The body and universe exist within the waking or dream.
Thus, the body and the universe are limited to waking or dream. The invisible Soul, the Self, is the cause of the universe, which appears as waking or dream and disappears as deep sleep.
It is within the waking or dream as their formless substance, and it is without the waking or dream as their formless witness. It is within because the waking or dream is merely an illusion created out of the Soul, the Self, which is in the form of consciousness.
The forms and names within waking or dream have no value because the waking or dreams are merely an illusion mirage created out of consciousness.
The waking or dreams are impermanent, whereas the formless substance and witness of the waking or dream are permanent.
True Self is beyond the waking or dream because it is neither the waking entity nor it is the dream entity.
The Self exists by itself only in deep sleep without the limitation of sense of form, time, and space. The Self is an attributeless, non-dual entity that alone prevails when all three states are negated mentally.
The view of materialists that there is no self or soul different from the body has to be rejected because the consciousness itself is the Soul, which pervades all three states.
Materialists do not accept the existence of a soul different from the body, but how can they find the soul within the body when it pervades everything and everywhere in all three states?
All the confusion is because some thinkers hold that the physical body itself is the self, another that the sense organs are the self, yet another that the mind is the self.
All these are rejected when one becomes aware that the Soul, which is in the form of consciousness, is the true Self.
Many people hold on to the concept that there is no such thing as the Soul because their teacher said so, or some teaching says s,o or some scriptures say so.
Thus, they get stuck with the idea of no soul and remain stagnant water, dropping all further investigation and trying to find answers for their shortcomings in their worldly life.
A deeper investigation reveals the fact that the individual self is limited to the waking entity or dream entity, which is not the Self, because the waking experience is also a falsehood. Therefore, the Self is the formless knower (witness) of the coming and going of the three states. And also, it is the formless substance of the three states. Thus, the soul is in the form of consciousness, is the true Self.
Consciousness is devoid of all qualities and is neither a doer nor an experiencer.
In ignorance, it appears as the waking experience or a dream. And in deep sleep, it remains in its formless non-dual true nature.
Thus, the one that appears as waking or dream and disappears as deep sleep is consciousness.
Thus, all three states are conscious because there is no second thing that exists, other than consciousness.
In deep sleep, there is neither waking nor dream experience. The dream is parallel to the waking state, and the waking state is a parallel dream. In the deep sleep experience, the waking or dream too is dormant, and consciousness alone is there.
In deep sleep, there is only non-dual tranquility and total ignorance of everything, as is proved by the fact that, when a person wakes up from sleep, he or she says, “I slept deeply, I did not know anything”. This proves that the soul, which is in the form of consciousness, exists in deep sleep in its formless, non-dual true nature.
In deep sleep, there is nothing but consciousness. The waking or dream is only a mirage created out of consciousness.
Due to ignorance, the mirage is experienced as reality by the false self within the false experience. When Self-knowledge arises, this ignorance is destroyed, then the self, which is in the form of consciousness alone, remains, which can never be negated.
The division into castes and neither stages of life, nor the rules of conduct and duties of the various castes and stages of life, apply to the false self within the false experience.
Religion, meditation or yoga rituals, scriptural studies, and following the spiritual laws are the greatest obstacles in realizing the ultimate truth.
Since the notions of ‘I’, ‘I Am’, and ‘Me’, ‘mine’ are of the false self within the false experience. If one can drop the identification with the ‘I’ or ‘I am’, then the consciousness [true self] will remain free from experiencing the illusory duality as reality.
In deep sleep, there is neither birth, nor life, nor death, nor world, nor gods, nor is there a total void, since consciousness alone exists as free from the experience of waking or dream.
The experience of birth, life, death, and the world is based on the false self within the false experience. On the base of the false self and the false knowledge, the waking experience is experienced as reality. But when that false knowledge is not there, such notions also do not exist, as in the state of deep sleep.
When the Advaitic wisdom dawns, then waking experience ceases to be a reality, the dream ceases to be a reality; deep sleep ceases to be a reality because there is no division in consciousness, because everything is consciousness.
Thus, three states are merely an illusion created out of consciousness. Consciousness alone is all else is illusion.
Neither the religious view, nor the yogic, nor the scientific view, nor the atheistic, nor the intellectual view, etc., is tenable. Because of the realization of the part-less consciousness, the ultimate truth is absolutely free from diversity.
It always remains as the one self, free from all diversities, when one can view from the ultimate standpoint.
Consciousness has no such thing as upper or lower (part), it has no inside or outside, it has no middle or any ‘across’, and it has no eastern or western direction, because it is all-pervading like space or pervades space also. It is one and without parts. It remains as the one self, free from all diversities.
Consciousness is formless and colorless; it is neither tiny nor big. It is neither short nor long. It is not knowable since it is of the nature of effulgence. It remains as the one self, free from dualities.
There is neither teacher nor teaching, neither student nor instruction, neither “Me” nor “you”, nor this universe. The knowledge of the real nature of consciousness does not admit of different perceptions. It remains as the one auspicious self, free from all attributes.
Consciousness, which is the true self, does not have the state of waking, nor of dream, nor of deep sleep. These three states are only the products of ignorance. Consciousness is beyond these three states, and it remains as the one self, free from all states.
Consciousness is all-pervading, is the desired goal, is self-existent, and is not dependent on anything else, while the entire universe, which is different from it, is unreal. Consciousness remains as the one self-free from all divisions.
It is not one; how can there be a second different from it? It has neither absoluteness nor non-absoluteness. It is neither void nor non-void since it is devoid of duality. It cannot be described what which is the invisible essence of all three states is:~ Santthosh Kumaar
