What is the Self…?
The Self is the all-pervading, unidentified Spirit. I precise: when we speak of the Self we are already in a state of duality. As Lao Tzu says: the Tao that can be spoken is not the real Tao. From a conceptual point of view, therefore with a description within the dual mind, the Self represents the absolute awareness not aware of the self, or the Absolute one without a second. The individual self (soul) is the reflection in the mind of that awareness. And here the question is what is the mind? It is that power of reflection that allows the Self to manifest itself in infinite forms (Maya or Shakti. - Time space energy).
Since the reflection of the manifested images has the Self as its substrate, it can be said - as Shankaracharya said - that the world is unreal if seen as separate from the Self, but becomes real if seen as the Self. The realized is therefore not a person but it is the Self, Like any character of the dream at the moment of awakening he ceases to exist as an "individual of the dream" and awakens as the dreamer subject. The similitude is imperfect… as mentioned above….”
The pure mind, freed from the sense of the separate self, is the Self itself. There are no two selves. The Self being the only reality cannot be obtained by efforts, it is always present, the spiritual work is aimed at the purification of the mind, until one realizes that a mind separate from the Self never existed... It was only a reflex, a game in consciousness. Here I am not speaking of "conjectures" but of real experience... which goes beyond any religious or worldly or psychological concept that is...
It is true that we live in a world where existence appears to be made up of innumerable beings, but in the final analysis we are all One. As far as spiritual growth and Self-realization are concerned, the masters help us, they show the way and provide - on the basis of our evolutionary needs and our karma - to remove the obstacles that stand in the way. But - as Ramana Maharshi himself clearly states - the commitment of the seeker is necessary, since the realization cannot be given to him but must arise by itself within him.
This is an indispensable condition, even if from the final point of view of the absolute there is never a moment in which the Self is not present... and Ramana himself, in other contexts, declared that "one day you will laugh at your same efforts to get what you already are..."
The imponderable help that comes from the Master is defined as "Grace" and exists... it is the spiritual push that allows souls to "return to the Matrix", which is the Self,... "Grace is always present but the sometimes the seeker is not ready to receive it, due - as mentioned - to the obscuring tendencies - then slowly due to the suffering resulting from the repeatedly committed errors (karma) the heart of the seeker "opens" to the truth... and to Grace and all 'Love and to Knowledge.... the Master, the Grace, the Knowledge... are expressions of the same Truth, which the seeker eventually realizes as his own intrinsic nature, forms of his own Self.
Once the experience of the Self has been had the mind of the seeker returns to seek it, thus he concentrates more and more on the quest until awareness prevails in a stable and definitive way. Nisargadatta said: "Constancy and determination are necessary"
Paolo D'Arpini
Since the reflection of the manifested images has the Self as its substrate, it can be said - as Shankaracharya said - that the world is unreal if seen as separate from the Self, but becomes real if seen as the Self. The realized is therefore not a person but it is the Self, Like any character of the dream at the moment of awakening he ceases to exist as an "individual of the dream" and awakens as the dreamer subject. The similitude is imperfect… as mentioned above….”
The pure mind, freed from the sense of the separate self, is the Self itself. There are no two selves. The Self being the only reality cannot be obtained by efforts, it is always present, the spiritual work is aimed at the purification of the mind, until one realizes that a mind separate from the Self never existed... It was only a reflex, a game in consciousness. Here I am not speaking of "conjectures" but of real experience... which goes beyond any religious or worldly or psychological concept that is...
It is true that we live in a world where existence appears to be made up of innumerable beings, but in the final analysis we are all One. As far as spiritual growth and Self-realization are concerned, the masters help us, they show the way and provide - on the basis of our evolutionary needs and our karma - to remove the obstacles that stand in the way. But - as Ramana Maharshi himself clearly states - the commitment of the seeker is necessary, since the realization cannot be given to him but must arise by itself within him.
This is an indispensable condition, even if from the final point of view of the absolute there is never a moment in which the Self is not present... and Ramana himself, in other contexts, declared that "one day you will laugh at your same efforts to get what you already are..."
The imponderable help that comes from the Master is defined as "Grace" and exists... it is the spiritual push that allows souls to "return to the Matrix", which is the Self,... "Grace is always present but the sometimes the seeker is not ready to receive it, due - as mentioned - to the obscuring tendencies - then slowly due to the suffering resulting from the repeatedly committed errors (karma) the heart of the seeker "opens" to the truth... and to Grace and all 'Love and to Knowledge.... the Master, the Grace, the Knowledge... are expressions of the same Truth, which the seeker eventually realizes as his own intrinsic nature, forms of his own Self.
Once the experience of the Self has been had the mind of the seeker returns to seek it, thus he concentrates more and more on the quest until awareness prevails in a stable and definitive way. Nisargadatta said: "Constancy and determination are necessary"
Paolo D'Arpini