Is The Mind A Myth?-Part II

Ramana Maharshi

-Staff

By Staff

Monday, April 21, 2008, 13:56

Logically if we must know about the mind and its nature, we have to find out about the individual, about the feeling of individuality. Our daily experience of waking, dream and deep sleep holds the key to this. Individuality is existent in waking and is absent in sleep. Since it is discontinuous it must have a source from which it rises and into which it subsides. Must it not?

On the basis of his experience Ramana has indicated its source to be the spiritual heart on the right side of the chest. What is the nature of this heart? It is the fullness of consciousness. If the mind has a conscious source, its nature must be consciousness. It is precisely this point which Ramana explains in great detail to Gambhiram Seshaier, at the turn of this century. The nature of the mind is 'intelligence, pure and undefiled'. It is a wave in the sea of consciousness. One can never lose sight of this fact for in it lies the way to our freedom.

As long as the mind remains anchored in its source its purity is unsullied. However, presently it is merged at its source only in deep sleep and that too involuntarily. Due to the rising of latent thoughts on waking, the mind is in continuous association with some thought or the other without let. These associate thoughts may be 'good', 'bad', 'neutral' and so on. But they are all dangerous. If you let in one thought by paying attention to it you are done for. Because the mind's natural purity and silence would be disturbed and muddied. The gentle patience of Ramana in explaining this point is touching. As he says, one should not give room to such thoughts: 'is this good?' or 'Is that good?' or 'Can this be done?'

One should be vigilant even before such thoughts arise and make the mind stay in its natural state. For no thought is our friend. It is a foe in disguise ready to topple us; once thoughts surface they cause 'more and more evil' to use the strong expression of Ramana. It is seldom that Ramana uses such a strong expression. But he does so about conceptualization for there is no point in mincing matters when it comes to restoring to us the means to be free and ever joyous. Free of what? The pollution of the mind. The overcrowding of the mind. The dissipation of the mind's energy in innumerable thoughts working at cross purposes. Not that one cannot handle the mind after the 'I' is badly mixed with its associates, the other thoughts. But this would then be a salvage operation of questioning to whom thoughts relate, which is often time consuming and frustrating. Instead, if vigilant, one can prevent foothold to thoughts which are ever ready for the unguarded moment.

The very simplicity of the step by step searchlight which Ramana throws on the mind is baffling. Why? Because we are unwilling to jettison, to throw overboard our false notions. We keep fumbling and groping like blind bats when the sun is shining brightly. Lost in the mind's labyrinthine ways we end our lives grumbling and complaining about a mind which is out of control, restless and chaotic. Should we not give ourselves a chance to be that vastness of silence when the mind is abiding at its source?