Drg Drsya Viveka — Lectures by Swami Sarvapriyananda

Om, may Brahman protect us both — the teacher and the taught

May Brahman give us the fruits of this study

May we accomplish great things together

May this study enlighten us

May there be no disharmony amongst us

Om peace peace peace

Welcome to the first class on the subject — Introduction to Vedanta. Questions like Who am I? What is God exactly? What is the purpose of life? How can I get permanent satisfaction and happiness, if at all that is possible? How can I overcome sorrow? What is this universe which we see spread out before us? If these questions are of interest, and they are of interest to everybody, then this course is for you. The answers that we will discover are the answers provided by the most ancient civilization on this planet. The answers given are the answers found by the sages of the most ancient religion existing on this planet today. These are the answers that we get from Vedanta.

The text selected for this class, called Drg Drsya Viveka, Analysis of the seer and the seen. This text is what is called a Prakarana Grantha — an introductory text. This text is a very exciting text. The author does not beat about the bush, does not waste any time on preliminaries. Though there are important preliminary questions but he dismisses all of them. And he goes straight into the heart of the matter; in the very first verse. It’s quite interesting to note that all traditional texts start with salutations to Guru, to God and so on — he doesn’t even do that! He goes straight into the subject matter. And the text is dramatic. Maybe the most important verse in the whole text is the first verse. And there are other remarkable verses which come one after the another, which have become famous in the entire corpus of Vedantic literature. So it’s a text which is full of drama, of movement, profound philosophical thinking. So in the spirit of this text, instead of wasting time on preliminaries, we shall go straight into the subject matter.

The author of this text is obscured in mystery. One source puts it as Adi Shankaracharya wrote this text 1200 or 1300 years ago, but that is not very credible idea. There are two other possible authors — one is Bharati Tirtha and the other one is Vidyaranya. You might have heard of a very well known non-dualistic text called Pancadasi. So the author of Pancadasi, Vidyaranya was probably the author of this text. If he was indeed the author of the text, the text is 600 years old. But you will see how fresh it is and how powerful it is. So without any further introduction, further advertisement, let’s go straight into the text.

The book has 46 verses. There are 2 versions of this book — one with 31 and one with 46. Traditionally it is said that verses 1 to 31 are the original verses, and we shall see that it completes the whole text. So we shall see 1 to 31. Scholars feel that the verses 32 to 46 have been added later, so we will not go into all that.

When we study this, the procedure I would like us all to follow is 3-fold. First, we shall study the verse, we shall translate the meaning and talk about the meaning. So the first stage is — am I able to repeat back what is there in the text? What we should require of ourselves is that once I read it and I listen to it, can I repeat back what the book says. I am not asking you if you have understood what the book says. The first stage is simply to repeat back — this is what the book says. Maybe I don’t understand it, maybe I don’t believe it, but can I say what the book says. That’s the first stage.

Then the next stage is — do I get it? Do I understand? Intellectually. So I should be able to answer questions, doubts, which come up in my mind.

And the final and most important stage — is it real to me? What the book says, can I recognize it as a fact? If you can recognize it as a fact, that’s the last stage or the penultimate stage to enlightenment.

Having said that, let’s plunge straight into the text.

Verse 1

Roopam drishyam lochanam drik, tat drishyam drik tu maanasam;

Drishyaa dhee-vrittayah saakshee, drik eva na tu drishyate.

What does it mean? Now I am going to talk about this verse in four stages. And all throughout, I would like us all to remember one operating principle.What is that operating principle? The seer and the seen are different. Seer means — I am the seer. Seer here literally means the one who is seeing. I am the seer, and this book here is the seen. And they are obviously different. You can clearly see these two are different. What do you mean by different? Different entities. The one who knows is different from that which is known. The subject is different from the object. This is the operating principle. And here the book is not asking us to accept anything on faith. It’s common sense. That’s what we accept anyway. Eyes see something, and what the eyes see is different from the eyes. That’s common sense, we know this. Everybody knows this. And the book says, that is sufficient! Just hold on to that.

Now what does the verse say. I told you 4 stages.

Stage 1: The verse starts very simply. It says forms, colors are the seen, the eyes are the seer. The eyes see and forms are the seen. They are not making up sophisticated statements — not a scientific statement, not a deep philosophical statement, just common sense. Just the way we experience the world. Eyes are seeing and the forms and colors in the world are seen. Now what is the principle that we were going to hold on to? The seer and the seen are different. So the eyes are different from what they see. Quite obviously true. In fact, unless the object is at a distance from the eye, the eyes cannot see. The only thing that eyes cannot see are the eyes themselves. So the seer and the seen — the eyes are the seer and the seen is this world of forms — whatever you see. Now what the verse is going to do here is — like any good teacher, the book, the author starts from the known and will take us to the unknown. From the near to the far. From what is, to what shall be. That is the golden rule of teaching. And that’s what the author is doing.

Now the eyes are one, the one organ of vision, but the things the eyes see are many — white, black, gray, people, benches, carpet, light. So many forms, all seen by the same eyes. So what is the principle we extract from this? The seer is one, the seen are many. That is the first lesson. The second lesson we take from this is — if we sit here we find that what we see is continuously changing. Isn’t that so? The eyes being relatively same and unchanging, but what is sees continuously changes. So the seer is relatively unchanging, the seen keep changing. Now let us go deeper with these 3 lessons.

Stage 2: The book tells us — the eyes themselves become the seen, and the mind is the seer. It means not only do I see the world with my eyes, but I also know with my mind that my eyes are open. I know it! “I can see very well — I know that my eyes are good”. “I can’t see very well, I need contacts”. So the condition of my eyes, those are known to me. Who knows that? Not the eyes themselves but the mind reflects upon the condition of the eyes. So the mind is the seer. Now the word seeing is used metaphorically. It means the knower. So the mind becomes the seer, eyes become the seen. The mind becomes the knower, the eyes become the known. Fair enough. We know all the condition of the eyes and the whole body in fact. Not only the eyes, the same applies to the ears, the nose and all the sense organs. In fact, the whole body. It is the known and the mind is the knower.

Now let’s apply the 3 lessons we learnt earlier. The first and fundamental operating principle — the seer and the seen, the knower and the known are different. Is it true the mind is different from the eyes? Yes, pretty obvious! Same for all sense organs. Number two, the condition of the eyes, ears, nose keeps changing. Sometimes eyes are good, sometimes you cannot hear well and so on. All of these varieties of conditions of the body is known by the same mind. Third, conditions of the body keep changing but the mind is relatively unchanging. It’s the same mind after all. Now let’s go deeper, now the magic begins.

Stage 3: The third stage of the verse talks about — the mind itself as seen. Are we not aware that I can understand what this person is saying? Are we not aware that I cannot understand what this person is saying? When I want something, when I have a desire, I am aware of my desire. When I’m happy, am I not aware that I am happy? When I’m sad, am I not aware that I am sad? When I can remember something, am I not aware that I am remembering something? If I cannot remember something, my memory is failing me, am I not aware that I cannot remember something? So all the functions of the mind are known to us. Whatever is happening in the mind is more or less known to us. We are aware of it. Therefore, the mind is also something that is seen. It is something that is known. We can immediately do it. Close your eyes and look into the mind — it’s called introspection. So the mind is something that is known. If the mind is known or seen, there is a seer of the mind. There is a knower of the mind. What it is? We don’t know exactly but we can call it the witness. The sanskrit term is sakshi. Let’s call it the witness. Why would you call it the witness? Because it is that which sees the mind. So the mind becomes the seen, and there is a seer of the mind, within us.

So what? Well, here’s where things start getting fun. Let’s apply those 3 lessons. Number 1, the seer and the seen are different. That witness which watches the mind is different from the mind. Second one is, the seer remaining one, the seen are many. Thoughts, feelings, emotions, ideas are many in the mind. Continuous stream of movement in the mind but the knower of the mind is the same. Third, the mind is continuously changing, but the sakshi, the witness is not changing. It watches unchanging. So what? Well, here’s where I usually tell a story. It’s very instructive and interesting story.

There was this businessman in India, who had problems like businessmen do. And what they do in India is they go to a Swami and the Swami usually lives in the Himalayas. And the higher in the Himalayas, the wiser he is supposed to be. As it gets colder and you wear less and less clothes as you go up, and that’s a really great Swami. So the businessman goes pretty high up and says to the Swami, “Oh Swami, I am miserable, help me!”. Swami says, “Do you experience your misery?”. He says, “Of course I do! That’s why I’ve come to you.” Then he says, “If you feel your misery, then you cannot be miserable. You are the knower of the misery in your mind. Because the knower and the known are different. Misery is a feeling in your mind.” That which is aware of fear, is not fearful. That which is aware of sadness is not sad. Now this person thought about it. And if you think about it, at the very least the problems in your mind will become quieter. The moment you put some psychological space between your mind and yourself, what happens is we start questioning whether these belong to me. I am aware of it but do they belong to me. You will say of course they belong to me! Why? Have we ever asked this? Does the mind belong to me? We think we are the mind. If you make a distinction between yourself and the mind, you will say “Swami even if I am not the mind, but at the very least it’s MY mind! So I care whether there is sadness in the mind or misery in the mind or ignorance in the mind”. But is it really your mind? “What kind of question is that of course it’s my mind!” Well, think about it. You board a train and you have a passenger who sits in front of you. And you get to know this guy — you know his name and what he does and you can see him, what he looks like, what he talks like. After a few hours he gets down and he’s gone. Just because you know about him, just because you are with him for a few hours, he doesn’t belong to you. Never has, never will. Anyway more of that later. Now, the man thought like this and his mind calmed down a little. And he came back to the Swami and he said, “Swami you are right. That’s really profound Swami. I am very peaceful now.” The real fun starts now. That was not the teaching, the teaching comes now. And the Swami immediately says to him sharply, “No! You are not peaceful, you are the knower of the peace in your mind!” You see how profound that is. The moment I say there is misery in my mind and I get attached to it, the Swami tells me that I am not the mind. The mind calms down a bit and starts feeling peaceful. Now the moment I say I am peaceful, I am again attached to the mind, what will happen is this chap when he goes down from the Himalayas, the peace disappears again! That’s the nature of the mind. You are the knower of the peace in your mind, you are the knower of the lack of peace in your mind. You are the knower of the happiness in your mind, you are the knower of the misery in your mind. You are different from the happiness, you are apart from the misery. You are the observer, quite different from the peace in your mind. In fact, thus being different from the peace or the lack of peace in your mind, that is true peace.

In the upanishads, Mandukya upanishad, one of the names for the Atman, the Self — one of YOUR names is Peace, Shantam Shivam. It’s not that the spiritual self is peaceFUL. It is peace itself. You are eternally undisturbed regardless of the mind or the world. That is the real witness. That is what you are. Even when you clutch the mind to yourself — this is my mind, the misery of the mind is my mind, the ignorance of the mind is my mind, even then we are telling ourselves something false. We are so strongly attached to the mind and through the mind to the world. I often give this very stark example, you find in Vedanta. Think of the greatest possible attachment in the world — the attachment of a mother for her baby. It’s extremely strong. Whatever the mother does, somewhere at the back of the mind will be awareness of what the child is doing and how the child is. Now imagine, when the baby goes to sleep and finally the mother goes to sleep, that mother who was tremendously attached to the baby, happily, completely, totally forgets the baby. Not unwillingly, willingly goes into deep sleep — complete forgetfulness of the world, of the baby, of her own body, everything — forgotten. And the mother does that every night! It’s a common experience we never reflect on it philosophically. So whatever is there in the mind, you are the witness of the mind and the witness is ever separate from the mind. The very fact that you are the knower of the mind means you are NOT the mind.

Not yet Vedanta! Very far from it, but already just about every problem in the world is solved. What a strange statement! Think about it — problems are in the world or in our bodies or in our minds. If you are separate from the mind, you are an entity independent of the mind and the body, the problems of the mind and the body do not touch you. You may be aware of them — when they come up you are aware of them, when they go away you are aware that the problems are gone. But they are not your problems. They never were, they never will be. You are free to hold on to them. My misery, my poverty, my failure, my desires. But they do not belong to you. You have to learn to let of what you actually cannot hold on to. It will go away anyway. It has come, you imagine that you are holding on to it, it will go away. However hard you hold on to your worst problem, it goes away. It goes away every night! Just think about it — the guy with the worst kind of problems — a dying man in the hospital, the moment that guy goes into deep sleep, his deep sleep and the billionaire’s deep sleep and Obama’s deep sleep, their deep sleep are exactly the same. No problems.

Alright, now — learning to let go. I can’t help but tell another story here that the Swamis in the Himalayas tell. What is this learning to let go? There was this monkey and a farmer who used to keep bananas in a jar. And the jar had a narrow neck. The monkey would watch this. When the farmer would go away, the monkey would come down from the tree, put its hand in the jar, take out the bananas and run away. The farmer thought how do I control this pest. So he got a jar with a much narrower neck and he put it there and forced the bananas inside one by one. The monkey watched all this. When the farmer went away the monkey climbed down, put its hand in — you can imagine the triumphant grin — and caught hold of the banana. But the problem is now that it can’t pull the banana out of the jar. Because the neck is not wide enough for the banana and its hand. Then the farmer comes back and thrashes the poor little monkey. Now how can the monkey escape? The only way the monkey can escape is to let go of the banana. But this doesn’t occur to it, it’s so attached to the banana. It will not let go and takes a beating. It can just let go and run away. But it will not let go. It is not trapped! The only thing that traps it is its desire and its confusion — that I cannot take my hand out. You cannot take your hand out because you are holding onto something which is not part of your hand. By letting go of the banana, the monkey becomes a monk. You let go of what never belonged to you anyway. What does not belong to you — that which belongs to the world, that which belongs to the body, that which is part of the mind. None of these belong to you. You are the witness. Now.

Stage 4: Here is where Vedanta really starts. So supposing such a witness is there. Even if I feel “Okay it could be true that I am this unchanging witness. It’s only because I have identified with the body and mind that I feel I am this limited individual. The body is born, I feel I have been born. The body gets older, I am getting older. Body gets sick, I am sick. In the mind there are thoughts you know. The mind learns something so I have become learned. The mind forgets, I have forgotten.” Oh I cannot but tell you this story. See how even before coming to the 4th stage, the third stage helps us.

One of the greatest scholars I have met — master of both eastern philosophy and western philosophy. A philosopher — he’s still alive, I met him at one of our ashrams in India. And he had a mild stroke. He taught in the USA, Germany and India. So he is old, had a mild stroke and he was a little depressed. He told me, “Swami, I am forgetting what I had learnt. And I feel bad.” Imagine! Someone who has gathered millions of dollars over the years through hard work and suddenly economic bust or whatever, and he loses it. What you have worked for all your life and it’s slipping out of your fingers, so you feel bad. You have invested your life in that. So a great scholar has invested his entire life in cultivating learning and that’s going now. The mind is not sharp, mind is losing what it had learnt. That’s one picture. The other picture — there was a Swami in our order. Not very well known outside, but inside the order we all knew him — Mokshodanandaji — he has passed on now. He used to teach — even I am lucky to have studied under him. He used to teach in the training center in Belur Math. Vastly learned and a very great Swami. Now see the difference — I used to go to him with questions as a young novice. So one day I went to him. He used to be in what we called the Arogya Bhavan where the old Swamis stay. He was sick. 12–14 hours in a day sometimes oxygen had to be given to him. Always there was a twinkle in his eyes and a smile on his lips. Anyway, so I used to go to him with questions. Towards the end of his life, it was the last time I went with a question to him. He thought and he thought and he thought, and he said, “I can’t remember anymore, it’s all going away”. Okay, till this point it matches. Then next he said with a big smile, “Let it go, it’s work is done. All the Vedanta I have studied in my life, all the scholarship I have got — let it go. It’s work is done.” He has got something eternal, something permanent, something unshakable, from which position he can let go of everything. He can let go of the banana. There is no problem anymore. This is what happens when we truly, truly understand and feel that we are not the body, not the mind. Fine.

Now suppose we are this witness of the mind. Unchanging witness. Immediate question will be — “Great that’s what I want to know. Now can you tell me Swami how can I know this witness? How do I get this witness? How do I realize this witness?” And the answer comes in the last quarter. You can never know it. You can never know it.

More than a 100 years ago in London, Swami Vivekananda was giving a talk on Advaita Vedanta on Jnana Yoga and he said exactly this thing, “The Self cannot be known, it’s not an object of knowledge”. Then he hurries on and says, “But you must not go away with the idea that it is unknown. It is more than known. In every knowledge, the Self reveals itself.” The Kena upanishad says — what is the Self? The knower? the witness? The Kena upanishad says it is something different from the known. Oh so it’s unknown? No it’s something different from the unknown. Think about it! If I ask you a question, “What is it that’s different from all that you know, all the subjects you know, the people you know, your memories, ideas, opinions, different from all of that. And different from all that you do not know — there is vast ocean of ignorance that we have. We do not know many things. So there are many things which we do not know and many things which we know. What is it that’s different from both of them? It’s not something that we know, it’s not something that we do not know. Yourself! You say, “No Swami I know myself!”. Yeah? What do you know about yourself? You know what your passport tells you, your driver license tells you. You know your body, you can see the body. You know your memories, your family — all that is in the mind. And if you know all that it must be different from you. That which knows all this, do you know that? No! It cannot be an object of knowledge. And yet, it is not unknown — for what is more known than yourself. You know that you exist. You know that you are. It’s exactly like — how do I know you are there? Because I can see you. How do I know that my eyes are there? I can’t say because I can see my eyes. I know that I have got eyes and they are in perfect working order not because I can see my eyes, but because I can see you. Whatever I see proves to me not only that that object is there, but that my eyes are there. In the same way, whatever experience you have, it proves that you are the conscious self. You have a feeling in your mind, a memory, an emotion, it proves to you not only that the emotion is there in your mind but also that you are the witness — the conscious self. Every experience is a proof that we are this consciousness, we are this witness. The Kena upanishad says “pratibodha-viditam matam amrtatvam hi vindate” — when you realize the infinite existence, infinite consciousness in every experience of your life; not just in the temple or church, not just at the time of prayer, not just even in samadhi. In every experience, when you are talking, you are thinking, you are laughing. In every experience when that self, this Existence-Consciousness-Bliss, is realized, that is immortality! And that is possible.

So the fourth quarter says, this Self — the witness, is the true seer. What about the mind? It is the seen. This witness plus the mind becomes the seer of the body and the sense organs. This witness plus the mind and the body and the sense organs, become the seer of this world. But the true, real seer is this witness alone. Everything else is the seen. This witness is the knower, everything else is the known. And this witness is separate from all that is known. This witness is unchanging, everything else is changing. This witness is one, all others are multifarious, multiple.

This is in brief, the explanation of just the first verse. I’ll say one more thing — I said there are 3 stages of understanding these verses. One stage is you should be able to say now what the verse said. Number two is — understand what it said. Number three is — is it a fact for you? Is it real for you? Look at it — take it stage by stage. The first says the eyes are different and the forms are different — is this real? Is this a fact for you? Do you have to believe this? Is it high philosophy? No! It’s common sense. Is it a fact? Yes it’s fact that my eyes are different and this book is different. It’s a fact — I don’t have to learn about it. The book is just telling me what’s already a fact — it’s just drawing my attention to it. Second — that my eyes are different and my mind knows the eyes. The mind is the knower and the eyes and this body are the known and the mind is different from the sense organs. Is that a fact or do I have to believe it? It’s a fact — I experience it. Third stage: That the witness is different from the mind — is it a fact or is it something to be realized? Is it a fact now? That’s what the book claims. Most people would say at this stage — well it’s a great theory, I don’t disbelieve it, but it is something to be realized after lot of sadhna, lot of spiritual practice, then finally I will realize I am different from my body and mind. That’s all right, that’s not what the book is saying. Just as the eyes are different from this microphone, exactly in the same way you the knowing self is just now, right now, completely different from the body and mind. Only in our understanding, the monkey has caught hold of the banana. We have caught hold of the body and mind — in our understanding, now physically, in our understanding. That’s why we feel trapped. So just now also, it is a fact that you are not this body, not this mind. The sanskrit goes like this, “Roopam drishyam lochanam drik”. Roopam means form, drishyam means that which is seen. Lochanam means eyes, drik means the seer — drishta, drishta means seer. The book is — the analysis of the drishta and drishya, the seer and the seen. So the eyes are the drishta, forms are the drishya. Go deeper, second stage — “tat drishyam” — the eyes become the seen, drishyam, mind becomes the seer, drishta. And the mind and the eyes are different. Then the third stage — “Drishyaa dhee-vrittayah saakshee”. The mind, the thoughts, feelings, ideas in the mind — they all are drishyaa — things which are seen. And there is something watching them — that is called the saakshee, the witness. “Dhee-vrittayah”, the modifications of the mind. Here the word dheeis used as a global term — mano, buddhi, chitta, ahankara — those who are interested in Vedanta you know, all of them are included here. And finally the fourth quarter — “drik eva na tu drishyate” — that saakshee, that is the real drishta, the real knower, the real seer, that never ever becomes an object of knowledge. And that is who you are. That is who I am.

Many questions will come about this. “If that’s what I am, why don’t I know it”. “If I am this permanent witness, why is it that sometimes I am aware, sometimes I fall asleep, consciousness comes and goes, what happens to this witness”. All those questions will come. “What is this world? How was this created? What is its relation to the witness? Why is it there at all?” Things like this. So many questions are there which will come up one by one. I will stop here, we’ll do a peace chant and then we’ll throw it up for questions.

Om shanti, shanti, shantihi

Hari hi Om tat sat

Shri Ramakrishnara Paramastu

Question.

This question of dealing with pain — and the grossest form is physical pain. This question is immediate — and it works here too. It works here powerfully. It works here just now. Even before we are realized souls, enlightened souls, it still works. It works this way.

This question was asked by a student to Shankaracharya. There is a book called Upadesa-sahasri. In that, Shankaracharya gives this philosophical way of analysis of your feelings, emotions, pain and so on. Then the student asks this question — “But sir, if my hand gets burnt, it hurts. Even after I read Vedanta, it still hurts.” Shankaracharya says, “Are you aware of the pain?”. “Of course I am aware of the pain”. If you are aware of the pain, you are that which knows the pain — and you must be different from it. Remember, Vedanta is not anesthesia. Vedanta is not a pain killer. In hindi, they say — “Vendata tod phod nahi karti hai” — Vedanta does not try to change the world of appearance. Karma yoga tries to change something — it does good to the world and purifies the mind. Bhakti yoga tries to make a change by taking all our desired of the world and focusing them all on God, love God — it’s a change. Raja yoga, the path of meditation, makes a change in the mind, focuses the mind on God. And tries to attain samaadhi, which is also a state of the mind. Jnana yoga alone, does not try to change anything. It just tries to get knowledge, which removes ignorance. So it’s not going to take away your pain, but what it’s going to do is something more profound. Sri Ramakrishna — terrible pain of cancer in the throat. He’s lying there sick and weak in Kashipur, in Calcutta. Last days of his life. And Swami Turiyananda, Hari, he comes and asks, “Sir how are you today?”. Sri Ramakrishna sort of croaks, you know, “I can’t eat, it hurts”. And Turiyananda, I don’t know why, he said, “Well I can see that you are in great joy”. And Sri Ramakrishna bursts into laughter and he says, “This rascal has caught me”. That it pains and it hurts and I can’t bear it anymore — upto this we all understand, we experience that. The next part of it — it does pain and it’s terrible and at the same time I can transcend it in a blink of an eye — that is possible only for the Jnani. The same Hari Maharaja, Turiyananda ji, in the last days of his life — two incidents I’ll tell you. One is with Swami Atulananda, Gurudas Maharaj, with whom he was in America and later on in Benaras, in India — they traveled together. Once somewhere near Haridwar, there was a group of pilgrims and they were sitting together at night — Swami Atulananda who was Dutch and American, and Swami Turiyananda. They were sitting together and talking Vedanta and a group of pilgrims were gathered around them in a campfire and listening to talks on Vedanta. And then somebody disputed it. “Look sir all this sounds great. But that you are not the body, it’s easy to say these things. If you put your hand in the fire, won’t it get burnt?” And Turiyanandaji says, “I can do that. I can put my hand in the fire, it will get burned, but it does not affect me”. And he rushed to put his hand in the fire, and the others jumped in and caught hold of him and pulled him back. Now, this is one incident. The second incident is very well known. He was in Kashi Shivashram, in his old age. And he had a wound in the hand and it had to be lanced. The doctor came to lance the wound and said, “It’s going to hurt terribly and I’m going to put anesthesia”. The swami said, “No, there is no need to put an anesthesia. You can operate.” And the doctor did operate and the swami sat there calmly, smiling. Established, I believe, in the knowledge that I am not the body, not the mind. There is cutting in the hand going on, there is bleeding, there is terrible pain there — I watch all of that. That knowledge is so strong within him, that the knowledge itself calms the mind down, which wants to react in shock and pain. The funny thing happened the next day. The next day the doctor came again to dress the wound and opened the bandage and he was about to dress the wound, and the swami shouted in pain. The doctor was surprised, “Swami, this hurts I know, but yesterday when I operated, it must have hurt much more. You had no reaction then and you are shouting in pain now. What is the mystery?!” And the Swami said, “You should have told me that you are going to touch it, I could have you know, lifted my mind from the body.” They can do it immediately. So it’s possible.

Question

The moment you say that there is something watching the mind, and that which watches the mind is something different from the mind. But you see, the mind can also watch itself, which is not a problem when it comes to the body or the world outside. Mind has the capacity to reflect upon itself. This capacity is called introspection. So when I say I am watching the feelings in my mind, the thoughts in my mind, the memories of my mind, is it not simply the mind watching itself? Isn’t it introspection? I will give you the answer in brief in two ways. Just consider it.

One answer is a standard answer given in Advaita Vedanta. The clear proof that you exist apart from the mind will be if you have an experience where the mind is not there but you are there. Isn’t it? And they say deep sleep is exactly such an experience, which we have all the time. You say, “oh no in deep sleep I was not there”. You were not there, then who slept? “No it’s just the body that was sleeping”. But you wake up and you say that I slept happily. I did not know anything. If you did not know anything, then that was also an experience. Something must have experienced it. I’ll leave that with you. There’s a lot of arguments about it. There’s lot of thinking about it. And there are different schools of thought.

But that apart, let me give you a subtle but much more simple example. When you are not introspecting, when the mind is not watching itself, are you at that moment still not aware of the mind? When you do not think about yourself — “I am watching my mind”. Don’t do it! Normal times, talking, walking and all that. At that time also, there is a basic level of awareness going on all the time. Even when you are not self-reflecting. That is what is interesting. There is something illumining the mind. And the mind can of-course self-reflect. But when the mind is self-reflecting, it is one thought thinking about another thought. It’s one idea thinking about another idea or a feeling or something. Intellect pondering upon memories and feelings and perceptions. But apart from all that, still there is consciousness in the mind. Even when you are completely absorbed in the task. A surgeon operating on a patient — completely focused — in the state of what Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi would call “Flow”. Completely forgotten self-awareness. At that time is the surgeon conscious or not? Of course he is conscious! He is completely conscious. Just that “I” feeling is not there. The self-reflection is not there. That’s one function of the mind. So the witness is different from the ego. In fact, one of the definitions of the witness in Advaita Vedanta, is the witness of the ego. One who knows everything, but who is not known by anything. Who is that? You will say, “God”. No! In Advaita Vedanta, it’s you. The witness of the intellect, the witness of the ego.

We’ll go further into it. All those things will be explored slowly. So as I promised it starts with a bang, tremendous first verse. Advaita Vedanta, as we will see later on, what is Advaita Vedanta, what are the roles of meditation, what is worship — all those things have a role. We’ll plug them in as we go along. But it claims that all the worship that we do, all the religion that we do, all the good work that we do, all the meditation that we do — all of it, is supposed to culminate in this knowledge. This is the crowning jewel of philosophy in India. Dr. Radhakrishnan called it Advaita Vedanta — the fairest flower of Indian philosophy. I might even say it’s one of the grandest philosophies the world has ever thought of. So we’ll undertake this journey together. It’s a small book and should not take very long. So thank you very much!