The Higher Power

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Very nice.

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I'm glad you liked it, Lisa.

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Don't you just love the way he cuts through it to that with this diamond.

Have you ever seen any of these classic interviews with his early devotees?

Some priceless little glimmers in there. Here's one of them:

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woaw David! That is an amazing quote. It touches me deep. It is simply exploration in the body-mind.

What is amazing to me in this quote is that one can sense experience trying to find words.

Just amazing.

I've been a few times to his Ashrama in Tiruvanamalai and it's actually the only place on this planet I still have a desire to go. No need, but a desire.

Ramana is, to my understanding, beyond systems, as he digs into experience and then uses the ambient system to explain it.

Thank you David for this beautiful words.

I'll look at Lisaji's links later on as this passage is already too much for my mind.

Patrick

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Ah, the Self.  If the Self is not some external thing, then it is everything.  If it is everything, then realizing the Self is a matter of arranging one's internal structure, no?  I like to call that 'arranging' experiential abstraction.  I think I'll trademark that.

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Lisa, I had never heard of those interviews with former devotees. Thank you for linking us to them. That was touching, the one you linked.

Are there any audios of Ramana Maharshi? I don't believe there are. Here is some video footage, however.



Patrick, I am glad you liked it.

Patrick: What is amazing to me in this quote is that one can sense experience trying to find words.

That's perfect! I think his “Higher Power” teachings need to be seen in that context.



Tom: Ah, the Self.  If the Self is not some external thing, then it is everything.  If it is everything, then realizing the Self is a matter of arranging one's internal structure, no?  I like to call that 'arranging' experiential abstraction.  I think I'll trademark that.


I have been thinking along those same lines, “a matter of arranging one's internal structure.” I think that's a great way to look at it.

I think we could look at that restructuring in two basic ways: state training and stage training, the sort of stage training I'm talking about being those vertical stages where state realization is a part of the structure, according to the way Wilber now envisions third-tier stages (and as Aurobindo did interpret them, Intuitive Mind, for example).

Horizontal state training—just looking at it narrowly for a moment—would involve meditative techniques (self-inquiry, insight practice, shamatha, etc) that orient oneself with “the Self” at rest.

Vertical stage/state development, however, would integrate that state in action as well and work with energies associated with those deeper states (the “Higher Power”).

Much of the enlightenment world is just concerned with the former. Of course most of the time the ones that emphasize horizontal state training also have some teachings on action as well, but not all of them. In fact, you will even run into some that discourage the idea that higher ethics have anything to do with the whole thing—a big mistake, because ethics are an integral part of realizing those states as a stage and working with the energies associated with those deeper states.

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I do like the way AC takes the Ramana experience into a contexual, evolutionary frame.  I think that step is in fact implied by what Ramana calls the Self, though I'm not sure he would necessarily agree or would put it that way if he did.  

In any event, Ramana is probably my favourite spiritual teacher.  He fundamentally got it, and drew implications from his perspective deeper than anyone else I've read (Byron Katie, perhaps surprisingly, IME excepted).  And he had great humour and conciseness, cuts the lard, like saying to the woman why not just say I am thou?  Makes me laugh.  

And I truly like how he respects all paths, including that of the intellect.  I find so much to like about him.  How did Jung talk about Ramana, a white spot in a white land.  

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Yes, I think there is a case to be made that the true lineage from Ramana Maharshi goes from Poonja to Cohen. I don't really like thinking in terms of “lineage” that much, and the other streams leaving Maharshi are also valid and worthwhile, but in the true lineage the teachings will change, evolve.

Yes, Ramana has been my favorite teacher or one of them as well. I go back and forth a little; Aurobindo is also very great and very pure in the way that Maharshi was. The two together make a great team. And Cohen and Wilber add a lot to the mix as well.

But Maharshi is a special kind of light. He was very clear and good and right and insightful on many issues. He was always available to his students, got up super early in the morning to help prepare the ashram meals, as early as 2:00am—how many spiritual teachers these days do something like that?

I find him deeply and continually inspiring. He seems to radiate goodness, clarity, and depth. I don't feel any personal motivations in his words at all, and yes, he is funny sometimes.  :)

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I think, if I remember well my readings, that Jung didn't go to see Ramana on his trip to India. Later on, he was asked why he didn't go to see him. His answer was that he feared he would have stayed there and fusion with the Self. Maybe he would have. It's actually funny how he chickened out! But to Jung's discharge, his travels always created a deep impression on him, which he took a long time to integrate. Plus he had some more writing for us to do. So Im'glad he didn't take the chance..

As for me, Ramana is an explorer. I have a hard time to put him into the “box” of hinduism, although he surely uses it. But I'm not sure he is embedded in it.

It's funny but I don't usually like to read his sayings. The thing I like is to watch his picture and his gaze. It seems it is enough to create an urge to go back to my own home. I also like to hang out at his place.
Occasionaly, one of his sayings, like the one David showed us, just hits me so hard, that it's enough for a while.

I think Ramana never formally initiated anyone. That's quite interesting to me. Many claim to have been initiated silently by him.

I remember once reading that he said that the source of the “I” that is attached to each thought springs up from the heart. I am following closely these days in my meditations this “I” but I have not yet discovered that it springs up from the heart. It seems for me, that it is localized psycho-physically around the tongue and specially the tip of the tongue. Does anyone of you have a similar experience or any information on the subject?

Patrick

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For Ramana, self discovery was a feeling based enterprise.  His referring to heart probably arises from this fact.

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Yes, the best recipe: heart and inquiry. Inquiry led annihilation. Such a 'simple' looking inquiry too, but one of the most potent of all the processes of surrender I've ever come across. I like how he puts it here:

“It is thus plain that the purpose of the intellect is to realize its own dependence upon the Higher Power and its inability to reach the same. So it must annihilate itself before the goal is gained”

And also in another way on p.19 of Maharshi's Gospel which you can download from this list.

David, I like what you say there about Ramana & Aurobindo being two of a kind. I completely agree. When I've been in Auroville, I have really loved seeing big pictures of Aurobindo and Ramana, together with the Mother, placed next to each other in various rooms. In the clinic, in the little ramshackle restaurant, everywhere! You cannot escape their combined gaze. :) Which is a very lovely thing, and gives off an everpresent sense of inspiration.

Patrick - here's a bit on the type of location you are musing on:

'Ramana Maharshi sometimes described the heart center as an actual object located in the right side of the chest, but at other times he said this was an oversimplification for people who couldn't understand the truth. According to H.W.L Poonja, Ramana Maharshi told him:
   
  When I speak of the 'I' rising from the right side of the body, from a location on the right side of the chest, the information is for those people who still think that they are the body. To these people I say that the Heart is located there. But it is really not quite correct to say that the 'I' rises from and merges in the Heart on the right side of the chest. The Heart is another name for the Reality and it is neither inside nor outside the body; there can be no in or out for it, since it alone is. I do not mean by 'Heart' any physiological organ or any plexus or anything like that…8'     8. David Godman, Nothing Ever Happened Vol. 1 (Avadhuta Foundation: Boulder, 1998), 143.

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Thank you Lisaji. that is helpful information. I also watch the videos…and they brought me back to “the Indian style”. Amazing.

This Poonja quote is going towards Tom's answers: enhancing “feeling” and the 4th Chakras focus.

But inquiry is leading beyond the body. i'm not there yet.

After practicing meditation that got me out of my body and stuck into joyful states- and saying “fuck you” to the next driver on the road half an hour after my meditation - I decided it was time to visit my lower Chakras!

I thank you for that quote from Poonja as it helps me following my psycho-physical journey, without focus on the heart.

I found out there's a connection between the tongue and each Chakra. It's as a circle of energy. Today it circled from the head to the 2nd Chakra.

I managed to go beyond the second, to the first one, to see the world from my asshole! No joke inteded! It looks dark!!!  No, in fact it looks good and grounding, but very depressing: as if all there is there, is acceptance of matter. But I didn't feel a connection between the first Chakra and the others yet.

No need to say, my head is unable to function. it's as if it's melting in the body. Wilber is gone as a cloud!

P.

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Patrick: As for me, Ramana is an explorer. I have a hard time to put him into the “box” of hinduism, although he surely uses it. But I'm not sure he is embedded in it.


I think that's just right: he used Hinduism but he transcended it.


His pictures are amazing, too. He is one of those few who seem to be the very picture of moksha and goodness.


Tom: For Ramana, self discovery was a feeling based enterprise.


Could you elaborate on this? What do you mean?



Patrick, it's interesting what you say about the tongue. In Chi Gong and other schools the tongue plays an important role energetically—there is a significant difference energetically when the tongue is held to the roof of the mouth in a certain area, not that one should keep it there all day (too much heat, my chi gong teacher said).

Lisa, thank you for the quote about the heart, and also the pdf, which I haven't read. I looked at that page and really liked it, though.

As for the heart located on the right side of the chest, that is very interesting. It is a felt experience, the heart shifting to the right side of the chest, but as your quote says one cannot say that the Self is located there or anywhere else. I had a quote about that bookmarked to perhaps post at some point. I will post it here:

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Hi David,
I think it's just more the fact that they are all the profound folk coming from that Tamil part of India. So locals and other Aurovillians place there pic's side by side. And often appear to be equally into both. They make a cool trio! I know Ramana didn't exactly like Aurobindo's world view, and thought it was ultimately a hindrance. But I think they are complimentary! One leading to the other, back and forth, but also some of Aurobindo's wild pondering on the body, on the supramental - he seemed ahead of his time in his own right. And a bit off the scale far out at times. He was a complete innovator. :)

Lisa

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Here's another interview of sorts! Described as: 'an imaginary interview in which the author compares, based on published quotes from Ramana Maharshi and Sri Aurobindo, what each of them might say to questions posed by a spiritual Seeker who is learning about the Indian tradition of Kevalya Advaita and Integral (Purna) Yoga. The article sheds light on the distinctly different spiritual approaches of these two masters.' :)

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David: Could you elaborate on this? What do you mean?


For Ramana, the Self is a state of abiding bliss, pure bliss, abiding and pure peace, happiness, etc., just look at the title of the book Talks.  There are a few passages where someone asks him whether realizing the Self is an intellectual affair.  He says no, it's based in feeling.  Of course Self realization must be based in feeling, as that which leads to it—misery, dissatisfaction, fear, pain, suffering, etc.—are all feeling-motivational states themselves.  This feeling basis is why Ramana associates Self with Heart.

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David: yes, in hinduism they say there is a “Bindhu” on the top of the pallate, where the tip of the tongue touches it. I practice these days a meditation that is a lot centered around sensations. I leave all I know behind and not only in meditation: I've stopped reading books since the beginning of the year. This helps me explore my psycho-physio being without too much projecting concepts on it.
I have no idea if what I feel is this energy point. I experience the tongue and the mouth cavity as the thought generator. Reflecting on it, it seems quite normal an association: thoughts/words and the tongue. I would imagine that thoughts spring up form the brain, as occidental science seems to think, but it is not my experience. It may simply be that thought is so associated with talking and the mouth, that getting in close contact with the sensations and observing thoughts, I percieve this zone as “the thought generator”.

As for emotions, I think I'm experiencing something close to the Chakra theory, and I believe it's an a posteriori theorising.
Emotions are circulating from the lower belly up to the solar plexus (anger, fear). The heart region seems to be associated for me with joy, spiritual sadness(a joyful sadness).

Getting in close contact with the root Chakra, or the sensations in that region, as I don't think about chakras while meditating, is, once the meditation is finished very grounding, but also quite a difficult experience: it has a taste of aceptation of the heaviness of matter.

What I seem to get at now is that the “I”, and there I mean the identification to my personnality, sticks itself at every zone of the body: each sensation, thought, emotion, once it appears, is stamped with an “I” colour. By observing this kind of automatic stamp, this I, I get beyond it. Well, “I get beyond it”! That begins to be tricky. The small I is suddenly transcended by a wider “I”. Maybe that is the higher power. The tricky part is that it is terribly difficult to have that kind of double vision, or attention: on the sensations and on the appearing “Iness”.

If I only observe the Iness, I tend to loose the connection with the body, and I kind of know that I can do that easely, but I'm not sure of it's benefits for me at the moment.

Hugs to all,

Patrick

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Lisa, yes, they are complimentary for sure!

But if we integrate them we would have to be careful to put Maharshi into Aurobindo's box rather than the other way around. Theoretically, Aurobindo is more inclusive, the bigger box. In other ways perhaps we could say Maharshi is better, but Maharshi's teaching could fit within Aurobindo's integral yoga but not the other way around very comfortably.

I didn't know their ashrams were so close, 65 miles. Thank you for the link. Is it significant they died in the same year?  :)



Tom: For Ramana, the Self is a state of abiding bliss, pure bliss, abiding and pure peace, happiness, etc., just look at the title of the book Talks.  There are a few passages where someone asks him whether realizing the Self is an intellectual affair.  He says no, it's based in feeling.  Of course Self realization must be based in feeling, as that which leads to it—misery, dissatisfaction, fear, pain, suffering, etc.—are all feeling-motivational states themselves.  This feeling basis is why Ramana associates Self with Heart.



I think this brings up some interesting subjects, and ones that I've been contemplating a lot recently. One interesting subject is the difference between “the witness” and causal bliss. As Andrew says in this quote, it is one of the most difficult things to really get:


Freedom Is Not a Feeling

“One of the most difficult but important things to understand, if one aspires for enlightenment, is that freedom is not a feeling. Freedom is not any particular experience, no matter how profound the experience may be. Freedom is not peace; freedom is not joy; freedom is not ecstasy. Peace, joy, and ecstasy feel free, but that is just a feeling of freedom; it is not freedom itself. A person who is not free can have an experience of sinking into the peace, joy, and ecstasy of the ground of being and feel during that experience as if they are free. But that doesn't mean they are actually a liberated human being. And on the other hand, a person who is free may experience pain, fear, frustration, confusion, or anxiety, and not lose their freedom. All experience comes and goes. The feeling quality of your own experience will always be changing, and all the more so if you live a deeply engaged and committed life. So if you want to be a liberated human being, that liberation is dependent only upon the position that you are taking in relationship to your experience; it's not dependent upon the quality or the content of the experience itself.”

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David: But if we integrate them we would have to be careful to put Maharshi into Aurobindo's box rather than the other way around.

Yes I fully agree. The complimentary part for me rests with the power of Maharshi's profoundly simplicity. As that is unquestionably great. At the same time, Aurobindo's yoga takes you so far and thoroughly into the layers & conditionings that you pass through when doing this type of inquiry that it doesn't bypass a single thing. I find that this brings deep, and the deepest levels of awareness to processes etc, and I really think Andrew Cohen's teachings, or even his general orientation pick that up in an enormous way - and make less of a mystery out of it than Aurobindo did. Once the psychic being is entered into the equation, I see both Aurobindo's and Maharshi's orientations as equally powerful forms of stripping away. The former having more juice in the dimension of getting on with the business of living in the world, or put another way - more conducive to the dynamic aspect that's unfolding.

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Lisa, that is so beautifully said! It is so perfect I hesitate to reply at all and mar its perfection.  :)

Yes, I agree every step of the way: the power of Maharshi's simplicity, the thoroughness of Aurobindo's yoga, and all the additions and clarifications of Andrew Cohen's evolutionary enlightenment.

Maharshi focused on the first face of God, with significant emphasis on the second but very little on the third. Aurobindo balanced that out a little more, and Andrew Cohen places a lot of emphasis on the first and especially the third and sometimes talks about the second.

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Thank you very much for such a great compliment!

You carved it into a nice 3 line summary: 
..the power of Maharshi's simplicity, the thoroughness of Aurobindo's yoga, and all the additions and clarifications of Andrew Cohen's evolutionary enlightenment.


Now that's pretty perfect. :) Isn't that just it! Those guys fit together beautifully. Like a very good masala.

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I enjoy this conversation, thanks to all of you.

The comparison of Maharishi and Aurobindo is difficult to make for me. They're both very tasty but so different!

Ramakrishna said, “why count the numbers of apple in an orchard? just jump in and eat the fruits”. I guess he was taking Maharishi's position here: dive in, find the source and don't bother with the rest.
Aurobindo counts the fruits and looks for ways to take care of the orchard! He probably is a unique figure in Indian spirituality. He seems to take care of the experience of the Higher self, but also of the ego/personality in the world. Wilber, Cohen and some others Occidental are trying to find the connection point between these two dimensions: the disolving of the “I” but also attendance to the “I”.

I personnaly haven't come to peace with these two dimensions, and I sometimes loose faith, thinking that they're irreconcilable.

It is also interesting to compare they're Ashrams. Aurobindo had a social vision and Auroville is an amazing idea (no matter it's actual state). He tried to create an alternative way for a community to live. But I think it must have been a tremendous work and many difficulties. Ramana's ashram is very different and probably less troublessom. A more classical Hindu Ashram, devoted to self-enquiry and feeding of the Saddhus and the poor.

Nisargadatta Maharaj was an interesting case of this mix. Cohen cited by David:”And on the other hand, a person who is free may experience pain, fear, frustration, confusion, or anxiety, and not lose their freedom. All experience comes and goes”. Nisargadatta described his state as saying that he lived the same experience as everybody else, anger and the like, but that it was just short and he saw them come and go.

In my twenties I did a huge research on this subject for a Master in psychology at university. I didn't know Wilber then. I centered my research around Swami Vivekananda. He was constantly shifting between a strong desire to help developp the ego, as he was really suffering from the slavery that human beings undergone (socially and internally) and at the same time he was drawned to say goodbye to all and medidate on the Self. I don't know if he succeded in finding a balance. I don't think so. Nonethelss, he is quite forgotten these days, but I think he started to draw a litlle map on the subject. Aurobindo says he had a vision of him in jail, if I remember well. He seems to have brought this union of duality vs non duality some step further.

On a personnal note, this apparent dichotomy, is tremendously painful for me these days. The most difficult part is to acknowledge the importance of making a living and sustaining a family. That implies going in the professional field and making ones place in it: selling oneself and the like.
There is some critics these days about how Wilber's enterprise is marketting. I think that's exactly the problem. He would have less problems and detractors if he would go in a cave and meditate. The same way, there's been so many critics voiced against Auroville, and so little about Ramana's ashram.

Taking care of the “evolving self” is a very painful enterprise, may it be in a family or a social endeavour.

Patrick

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David, Ramana's works, including Talks, can be downloaded from his ashram website here.  You can then computer search these works.  

Download Talks and search 'feeling.'  You will see from the resulting hits that Ramana thinks the I-thought is itself actually a feeling, or an 'experience' (defined as a state of feeling or belief or whatever).  'Feeling,' here, is used more broadly than, but includes, what Andrew references in the feeling quote above.  Andrew speaks of adopting a perspective.  That's fine so far as it goes, and I think I understand what he's saying, but if he is taken as saying realization is simply a mental perspective that can be learned like math, he's IMO being misinterpreted.  Going beyond ego must refer to a change in orientation in one's entire motivational (e-motional), responsive, experiential, theoretical, perspectival structure, or it's really not very consequential.  The entirety of one's core—motivational, responsive, etc.—is I think what Ramana references as feeling.

Also, if enlightenment does not inhabit at a feeling level, it's practically meaningless.  Emotional freedom is precisely what is gained by realization—freedom from all those emotional conditions I mentioned above: misery, suffering, etc.  One's emotional intelligence, I think, one's level of emotional reactivity and defensiveness, is a good barometer of one's spiritual maturity.  Recall how Andrew talks of defensiveness as a dead giveaway of ego inhabitation.

In the book version of Talks, you can find the reference I mentioned at pages 17 and 22.  Here are the transcriptions.  Notice the second quote essentially agrees with what Andrew says:

Page 17

D: Thoughts cease suddenly, the “I-I” rises up as suddenly and continues.  It is only in the feeling and not in the intellect.  Can it be right?

M: It is certainly right.  Thoughts must cease and reason disappear for “I-I” to rise up and be felt.  Feeling is the prime factor and not reason.

D: Moreover, it is not in the head but in the right side of the chest.  

M: It ought to be so.  Because the Heart is there.

Page 22
D: How long can the mind stay or be kept in the Heart?

M: The period extends by practice.

D: What happens at the end of the period?

M: The mind returns to the present normal state.  Unity in the Heart is replaced by a variety of phenomena perceived.  This is called the outgoing mind.  The Heart-going mind is called the resting mind.

D: Is all this process merely intellectual or does it predominantly exhibit feeling?

M: The latter.

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Thank you for the quotes, Tom.

Yes, I think it's a subtle thing that both Ramana and Andrew are talking about, one that's easily misinterpreted.

I think it might be described as an awareness  that includes pain, anguish, bliss, every feeling. (Speaking of it as awareness would indicate the causal, turiya, or a metaphor for nondual, turiyatita—Ramana also spoke of it in this way: “You are awareness. Awareness is another name for you.” Be As You Are, p. 11) And we can also say that the feeling of aspect of that awareness is bliss, but we have to distinguish that very carefully from the experience of bliss.

I think that's why AC chooses to say that “freedom is not a feeling,” to avoid that confusion, and that “a person who is free may experience pain, fear, frustration, confusion, or anxiety, and not lose their freedom. All experience comes and goes.”

Yes, I agree that the feeling aspect is nevertheless important and that, as you said, “the entirety of one's core—motivational, responsive, etc.—is I think what Ramana references as feeling.” That integration is what a lot of people miss in him, partially because he had appears to have had a largely metaphysical theoretical backdrop that didn't recognize structural development, like pretty much everyone else of his day (Aurobindo being something of an exception).

Andrew wants to get people out of feeling obsession, an obsession with comfort to the point where one doesn't evolve or participate in the evolutionary process. But if one gets what he is saying, one will have the “feeling of freedom” at the core of their being while not always at the surface, while those who are addicted to surface comfort (like drug addict, for instance) may feel trapped inside.


Patrick: Nisargadatta described his state as saying that he lived the same experience as everybody else, anger and the like, but that it was just short and he saw them come and go.


Yes, that's perfectly put! Ramana once said, “There is pain, but there is no suffering.”


Patrick: Wilber, Cohen and some others Occidental are trying to find the connection point between these two dimensions: the disolving of the “I” but also attendance to the “I”.


Yes, that is the really interesting thing. It doesn't quite work, in today's world especially, to think that all of life is maya and illusion and just ignore it. That might work nicely if you lived in an ashram or the like and all you had to do was follow the rules and be at meals on time, but in today's world it doesn't work.

Integrating those two, especially with a felt sense of freedom, is perhaps the hardest thing to do. I don't think there are very many spiritual teachers who pull it off, and many of those who appear to have set up ideal conditions for themselves: devotees who wait on them, compliment them, bow down to them, so one wonders what they would be like without all those supports.


Patrick: The same way, there's been so many critics voiced against Auroville, and so little about Ramana's ashram.


Yes, Aurobindo was quite ambitious—he not only wanted spiritual freedom for people but he wanted to transform the world. He recognized that spiritual freedom did not necessarily transform the person; Ramana Maharshi appears to have thought that it does necessarily transform the person. Thus, Aurobindo also taught the psychic-being yoga, which Ramana Maharshi also pointed towards just a touch.

But all Ramana basically (or usually) said was that nothing at all has to change (leave the world to the One who created it) and just inquire within, surrender, give up the ego, etc. So he asked nothing of people and gets little criticism. But when you start saying that people have to change and that the world has to change (like Aurobindo, Wilber, Cohen, etc.) then you hear it from those people who don't want to change or have a vested interest in the status quo.

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Thank you, Lisa.

Soon I will add Nagarjuna, and the circle will be complete!