Full transcript of “How to break the link between real and reflected consciousness in practising Drg Drshya Viveka?”. Click a timestamp to open the video at that moment. Need another video? Use the YouTube transcript generator.
0:04 Um this one this question is from Rashmi Karan. I understand especially after listening about Driisha Vivea that the relationship between the reflected consciousness and ego is natural and that the relationship of the reflected consciousness and consciousness with a capital C or Brahman is one of illusion. When I try to apply this principle in times of despair and discount the fact that I am the body mind, it does give me satisfaction to know that the insults or slights being hurled are not towards the real me. But then will I not have to
0:50 write off also the love that my immediate family may have for me? Because even that is to my untrue self. What is the meaning or value of the love my family has towards me if it is not towards the real me? >> Okay, good. Nicely trapped. [laughter] Let me explain the background first. If those who have seen dria vive you may or may not remember but it's a very interesting part of the text dria dria viveka is an introductory text for adita vanta this is the discrimination or the discernment of the seer and the seen the seer being ultimately ultimately right
1:35 now the seer is I am the seer you're all the seen but ultimately when when we investigate upon investigation we realize the seer is ultimately consciousness or awareness that's what exper experiences everything and everything else is an object to the seer. Objects which appear to consciousness. Now in that book there's a very interesting sequence where the author is helping us to pin down or to point out not pin down you can't pin it down but you can point it out what you are and the way to do that what he does that in in that book is what's the last thing that we can become aware of
2:21 it is uh the ego last means the most subtlest thing about myself. You know if I go from the body to the breath to the mind and my intellect, my memories, my ideas, feelings, everything go further and further deeper and deeper. It all goes boils back to I. I. The sense of I that then that's the ego. That's not the true self. That's the ego. And that ego feels aware. Right now just check for yourself. I am Yes. And is it aware? Yes, of course. This awareness reflected in the ego in the mind but in the ego especially um this is the subtlest thing that we
3:06 can be aware of. And this awareness is called reflected consciousness or reflected awareness in Sanskrit. Our real nature is awareness. Pure consciousness, pure awareness in Sanskrit chit abhasa means shadow, reflection. So chidabhasa means reflection of that pure consciousness. So this reflection of the pure consciousness. Now the author tells us center yourself there. I am and this awareness which I feel. Now what's the connection of this awareness to the body? And uh the author the questioner has written the book as you said in the book the book says this
3:52 ego the awareness in the ego the reflected consciousness and the body they are rel they are uh they are connected uh by birth it's natural as long as the body lives this eye this this aware eye this conscious eye will feel I am the body right now we feel that or at least I I am embodied or at least this is my body. This is natural. Why do you say natural? Because it starts with birth. The moment the eye comes to awareness, it also comes to awareness of itself in the embodied in this body. And it will end with death. When the body dies, people who have near-death experiences
4:39 and if you read the accounts floating up from the body, then they clearly have vanta will say aha. So you are where I am in the ceiling floating up from the body and the doctors are trying to revive the body. So clearly you are not the body. What happens that death is this natural link between yourself and the body is snapped. The body becomes an object to you. It always was an object by the way. But at that point that link is snapped. You are not this body. If you're born again in the biological way I'm born again. I seen the other ways of being born again. Okay, I can't resist this. [laughter] I saw a cartoon of an So there are born again Christians. This is born again Christian talking to a Hindu. He's saying I am a
5:26 bornag again Christian and the Hindu says I'm a born again and again and again and again Hindu [snorts] say born in that case the body the the reflected consciousness will get an natural connection to the new body the baby's body in which it is embodied. So it's a natural connection. The whole point is this eye, if you feel the eye, it has a natural connection with this body. It won't go until this body dies. Okay. What else? the um uh the the connection the um the connection between the mind the the ego
6:13 and the reflected consciousness is sahajam that it comes up whenever the ego comes up reflect consciousness will be reflected in Um so the term we used for the connection between the reflected consciousness and the body is karmajam or karma born of our past kmas. As soon as the past kmas for this body are exhausted this body will die and your connection with this body will end. And the connection between the mind especially the ego and into which this consciousness is reflected right now that is called sahajam natural. It's like a mirror and the face reflected in the mirror. If you
6:58 have a mirror in front of you automatically your face will be reflected in the mirror. Automatically you'll see a reflection coming in the mirror. If you take the mirror away no reflection. If you bring the mirror back again reflection. So this consciousness which we feel right now is like the consciousness reflected in the mirror of the eye. Neither the eye. I eye means the ego. Neither the eye is the true eye nor is this consciousness reflected in the eye. The true consciousness just like neither am I the mirror nor am I the face reflected in the mirror. Who am I here? Now finally what this this question has written the third thing that was pointed out in disha vive and most important
7:45 what vanta wants to point out you're not the body it'll come and go with your past karma you are not the mind whenever the mind cups comes up you'll find yourself reflected in the mind consciousness reflected in the mind but who am I truly the question is posed very precisely it's forensic in its precision this ego which we all aware of and it's the final thing the closest to the self. Most of us almost always we take the ego as the self but remember according to Vanta the ego is like the face is is like the mirror and the consciousness in the ego is like the face reflected in the mirror and you are truly neither the mirror nor the face reflected in the mirror. You are the real face you are the real consciousness actual consciousness. So the question
8:32 now is what is the link between pure consciousness atman Brahman witness consciousness whatever you want to call it toya chit sakshi whatever you want to call it the real consciousness and the consciousness that we feel right now the reflected consciousness in the ego what's the link why do we want to know that if we know that we can snap the link or at the very least we can follow the link back to ourselves and answer the question who am Is this question clear? The placing of the question, it's subtle. It's precise. It's very forensic. If the question is clear, now the operation can start. Snapping the link between your ourselves and our false
9:19 notion of body mind. You have to know where to snap it. You can't cut it anywhere. It'll be a terrible surgeon if you do that. Virant is a good surgeon. Cuts at the right place. That old story about somebody was called to repair a machine, a complicated, sophisticated machine. I read the joke in Reader's Digest. This uh expert was called in. Nobody could repair it in-house. The expert was called in. He looked at the machine, big complicated piece of machinery. He went to a particular spot and he gave it a kick and started working. And then uh said, "What's your bill?" And he gave the bill, $1,000. And the manager was furious. He said, " $1,000 for a kick. Could you please give me an itemized breakdown
10:06 of of what what what is it that you have done? What are the items?" So, he wrote the mechanic wrote back saying that here is the itemized bill that uh uh $1 for the kick and $999 to know where to kick. [laughter] So vanta tells you where exactly to look and then the snip the uh operation is very easy. So what is the link between the ego and the consciousness reflected in the ego which we must center ourselves in right now and the real consciousness. To help you with this imagine the mirror, your face reflected in the
10:52 mirror and the real mirror. It's exactly like that. It's almost exactly like that. What's the link between this face and the face reflected in the mirror? What What's the link? Nothing. There's no link. If link means if I think I am that that face in the mirror and you tell me you are not that, you're the real face and I'm saying help me out here. What's the link between me and the real so-called real face? You'll say there's no link. If you think there is a link, it's born of error. It's born of foolishness. In Sanskrit, the link between this ego and the consciousness in the ego and you, the real consciousness is born of error.
11:37 There's no link. There's no link. As one sadhu put it beautifully in Hindi straightforward bluntly he said [laughter] it's only foolishness which ties you to this body mind. Now this is all background. This is already the questionaire has got it all. I am the witness consciousness not linked to body and mind. Great. It helps me in times when my mind is unhappy, body is sick, people are insulting me then okay it works ramani I've told you the story I read it once that somebody wrote an article criticizing him and the sent him a copy and Ramanari in those days before X and
12:24 and Facebook and all nowadays you can instantly criticize a person and what's it troll trolling yes so somebody trolled told Mahatma Raman Maharshi and sent him a copy and Raman Mashi sat down and diligently corrected the grammar and the spelling improved it and sent it back to him and then somebody asked but Maharshi he's criticizing you and Raman Maharishi said no he isn't he's criticizing some fellow called Ramana if somebody criticizes the mirror and that mirror is twisted broken and The face in that is cracked and not clear. What is it to you? What is it to you?
13:10 So he says it works good. But now the question is so insults I can handle. Problems maybe in the physical body also some type of pain aches I can handle. It's an object. It's there. It's I'm aware of it. That's it. But what about love? What about praise? People like me. my own family, they love me, they cherish me. Isn't that also a love or the cherishing of the false self? Okay, pay attention here. It's a good question. It's an entry into the value of adita. What does adwita do for you? Especially in relation to love. Notice if you think like this, if I think like this, we want love. Then
13:58 what am I missing? I am missing the love of I'm worried the love of my family those are beloved to me those who like me very much is that love then empty suppose it is have you lost anything if we are demanding love from others we are very much in our our personality limited body mind personality if we crave appreciation and love from others why would you do that you are literally those others you're literally those others. You you not only love them, you are one with them. Every one of them for Raman Marshi the person in front of him his devotey and the person who wrote
14:45 a critical article trolled him both are equally not only beloved they are one with him. If you if you are uh uh if you realize yourself as this witness consciousness, you are as vast as the sky. The sky accepts everything gives resistance to nothing in this universe because it is you. This is far greater than any love. Not only greater, it will be expressed as love as unconditional love. Not just love of a beloved person, not just love of a family, not just the admiration of an admirer. Uh Facebook like Yeah. Not just that, much more than that. This is genuine oneness with others. So if they love you and do not love you, it
15:30 doesn't matter. You love them anyway. And you are happy in that. If they love you, yes, their love is towards the personality which you are. But that personality itself, is that love misplaced? Not really. The personality is a projection of yourself. They unknowingly they are loving you but they're loving the mask which is in front of you. Good. That's fine. It's not really ultimately misplaced. No love is ultimately misplaced. Hatred is misplaced. Viveananda in Lahore at that time he was traveling and another newspaper editor trolled him wrote something critical about him. Viveand was sitting in a group of people praising that editor and
16:15 then somebody said but Swami G are you aware he has written an article criticizing you and Swami Viveand said what do you mean I cannot recognize the good character of a person just because he's saying a few critical things about me so this is where you are fine with the criticism of others and with the love of others you love them regardless because you're you're endlessly confident you're decisive Massively confident in your real nature as limitless existence, limitless consciousness, limitless bliss. Your cup is overflowing. What could you want? What could anybody add to it? Yes.
