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Letter # 32 - The Question
The most consequential miscalculation I made when first entering the
spiritual path was to think that there was something to gain and
control, which would change my life and make everything easy. That
I would be invincible. It has taken fifty years to see that I will not
know the answer to this predicament and never will. As the years
pass, instead of becoming superior to suffering, the reverse has
occurred. The protective armour, carefully built and manipulated so I
would be invulnerable, began to crumble, and there was nothing that
could be done about it. In fact, there is a sensation of gratitude that the
heavy load is being shed. Suffering is there, but it has meaning now,
whereas before, the confusion and seemingly random surges of
negativity had no noticeable logic, which made it all the worse. There
was no perspective.
As alluded to in the previous Letter, when I arrived at Arunachala, my
mind was a mixed bag of thoughts and feelings that made no
connection in my present state of confusion. There were regular visits
to the meditation hall and temple at the ashram, and sustained reliance
on prayer to help me extricate myself from this predicament. Then
one day, out of nowhere, there was a permanent radical shift. What
happened is difficult to explain in words.
The decisive opening or initiation 1 was a transmission that activated
the mysterious question Who Am I? as enunciated by Sri Ramana in
his many instructions to disciples. It was not a philosophical
proposition. It was a living force meant to irreversibly stimulate the
mind to look inward. There was an active pulse that throbbed with
intent and purpose. My activities and thought patterns began to be
measured by that question. I can only presume that this initiation
came about from an intense longing, in the form of a prayer to Sri
Ramana, both in one-pointed attention free of intrusive thoughts and
concentration on his gracious form.
The best one can describe this is by a metaphor. Imagine the
policeman does, directing traffic. In this case, with Who Am I?, the
flow of signals generated by the brain is intelligently guided using a
new measure of priority. Instead of avoiding uncomfortable questions,
doubts, happenings, clashes, regrets, anger, resentment and all other
expressions of the mind’s unconscious reactions, they are deftly
accepted and at the forefront, a focus, a resolve forged by a higher
vision, not to deny but neutralise the negativities by discovering the
root of each thought as it rises. The very recognition of the thought, in
whatever form it may be, as it manifests, dissolves its capacity to
affect us. In other words, we see unequivocally see a ‘problem’.
All who meditate with any degree of seriousness experience moments
when a problem that may have rankled for years suddenly becomes
crystal clear as the naked root thought that spun a web of ideas and
emotions is perceived in its entirety. It is no longer a threat to one’s
equilibrium. Seeing directly is like magic. Who Am I? is the
diamond-sharp tool that cuts through our blindness. In Sri Ramana
literature it is termed the Brahma astra, the ultimate weapon that
destroys ignorance.
“The mind consists of thoughts. The ‘I’-thought is the first to arise in
the mind. When the enquiry ‘Who am I?’ is persistently pursued, all
other thoughts get destroyed, and finally the ‘I’-thought itself
vanishes leaving the supreme non-dual Self alone. The false
identification of the Self with the phenomena of non-self, such as the
body and mind, thus ends, and there is illumination, sakshatkara.” 2
The question Who Am I? is, in some respects, like a mantra but
without the manifestation of sound or its silent reiteration within the
confines of one’s heart. The difference being, it is not a repetitious,
mechanical activity but is, for want of a better description, a
understated, humming attitude (bhava) that, with frequent
remembrance, grows stronger until it dominates one’s mindset. If one
is alert, each time a thought begins, to whom does this thought arise?
And then there follows, if there is persistence, the urge that enquires
who is asking the question? Who is asking the question? Who?
Remain in the space of that consciousness that is asking the question.
“Meditation requires an object to meditate on, whereas in Self-
enquiry there is only the subject and no object. That is the difference
between them.” 3
This process brings one back to the centre of one’s consciousness and
the still, silent centre of one’s nucleus of existence. Sri Ramana
likened this sense of ‘I’ to the so-called sruti, the smallest pitch a
human ear can hear and in a classical music concert is played
continuously and monotonously on a tampura, which supports and
sustains the musician. The ‘I’ is the bedrock resonance underlying all
manifestations, both gross and subtle, of an individual.
“…If the enquiry: ‘Who am I?’ were mere mental questioning, it
would not be of much value. The very purpose of Self-enquiry is to
focus the entire mind at its source. It is not, therefore, a case of one ‘I’
searching for another ‘I’. Much less is Self-enquiry an empty formula,
for it involves an intense activity of the entire mind to keep it steadily
poised in pure Self-awareness. Self-enquiry is the one infallible
means, the only direct one, to realise the unconditioned, absolute
Being that you really are.” 4
Once, Bhagavan advised a simple group of village people who had
come for instruction. He told them about Self-enquiry. Afterwards,
Ganapati Muni, a senior disciple, questioned whether they understood
what Bhagavan told them and suggested that they first be instructed in
rituals and a mantra. Hearing this, Bhagavan said in response that
Self-enquiry was all he knew about sadhana, and he spoke from his
own direct experience.
“Self-enquiry leads directly to Self-realisation by removing the
obstacles which make you think that the Self is not already realised.” 5
The question Who Am I? rightly employed saves us from the depths
of our own self-inflicted ignorance. With the development of
concentration through practise of Self-enquiry, we learn to dive
deeper into the question. If we ignore the question, which is akin to
not caring to know the true north in our journey through life, we do
not know who we are. Suffering then wakes us up, and we return to
the question.
There is no so-called predictable answer to the question, and if we
arrogantly believe that we know the answer, we’re actually denying
the unfoldment. We are putting in place a block that hinders our self-
revelation. It is not an ostensibly incomprehensible koan meant to
confound the everyday mind and engender silence. Properly asked
Who Am I? directly creates a moment of complete, undivided
attention. By being empty of ourselves through questioning the root of
our thought process, the ‘I’ thought, it opens up the miracle for aham
sphurana, a surge of spontaneous self-awareness devoid of the
constricting thoughts with which we wrongly identify ourselves.
________________________
1. The question of initiation and transmission will be discussed
in a future Letter.
2. TMP Mahadevan, Introduction to Who Am I? (Nan Yar).
3. Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, Talk§390. p.372.
4. Maharshi’s Gospel, pp.35-8. Book II, Ch.1, Self-Enquiry.
5. Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, Talk 298. p.273.
Devotee: Can Advaita be realized by japa of holy names; say Rama, Krishna, etc.?
Sri Ramana Maharshi: Yes.
D.: Is it not a means of an inferior order?
M.: Have you been told to make japa or to discuss its order in the scheme of things?