D: - It is hard to conceive of God, the formless, giving rise to form.

BHAGAVAN :- Why hard? Does not your mind remain formless when you do not perceive or think, say, in
deep sleep, in samadhi, or in a swoon? 
And does it not create space and relationship when it thinks and impels your body to act? Just as your mind
devises and your body executes in one homogeneous, automatic act, so automatic, in fact, that most people are
not aware of the process, so does the Divine
Intelligence devise and plan and His Energy automatically and spontaneously acts - the thought and the act are
one integral whole. This Creative Energy which is implicit in Pure Intelligence is called by various names, one
of which is Maya or Shakti, the Creator of forms or images.

D:- 'Since the Self is free from the notions of knowledge and ignorance how can it be said to
pervade the entire body in the shape of sentience or to impart sentience to the senses?'
Wise men say that there is a connection between the source of the various psychic nerves and the
Self, that this is the knot of the Heart, that the connection between the sentient and the insentient will
exist until this is cut asunder with the aid of true knowledge, that just as the subtle and invisible force
of electricity travels through wires and does many wonderful things, so the force of the Self also
travels through the psychic nerves and, pervading the entire body, imparts sentience to the senses,
and that if this knot is cut, the Self will remain as it always is, without any attributes.
('Spriitual Instruction': II.12).

D:- Obstacles and Pitfalls.

The one which soon will betray itself as a great deposit of obstacles is the so-called mind, with its
main qualities, restlessness and dullness.
Don’t try to attain something! Sadhana is meant to remove only.
Deny reality to everything, including yourself.
It is not you who realises the Self; the Self reveals only itself. To whom? To Itself only.
Don’t fight against your ‘I’! Every resistance is strengthening the ‘I’ because the motive-power behind
resistance is ‘Will’!
Don’t suppress either! Because a suppressed thought, feeling or intention is bound to rebound! The
mark by which this pitfall is recognised is ‘I’ have realised.... This ‘I’ can only be a ‘wrong I’, because
it is not the ‘I’ that realises.

Disciple: If the world of the waking state comes into existence and falsely appears like
dreams through nescience, why should we speak of any distinction between the waking state
and the dream state and say that the waking state has relative (empirical: vyavaharika) reality
while the dream state has only personal (pratibhasika) reality?
BHAGAVAN: Since a dream appears without the help of the appropriate time, space and materials
on account of nescience accompanied by the defect (dosham) of sleep, it is spoken of as a personal
state.
Since the waking state appears in the Supreme Self which is free from time, space and materials,
owing to nescience alone, it is spoken of as the relative state.
They are thus described with reference to the three states of reality (personal, relative and absolute).
When we think clearly there is no difference between them. Nor is there any difference between the
waking and the dream states. Undifferentiated consciousness is the only true reality. Whatever is
different from it is personal and has nescience as its material cause and consciousness as its basis

Disciple: If the world of the waking state comes into existence and falsely appears like
dreams thr...
How long should enquiry be practiced?'
As long as there are impressions of objects in the mind, so long the enquiry ‘Who am I?’ is required.
As thoughts arise they should be destroyed then and there in the very place of their origin through
enquiry. If one resorts to contemplation of the Self unintermittently, until the Self is gained, that alone
would do. As long as there are enemies within the fortress, they will continue to sally forth; if they are
destroyed as they emerge, the fortress will fall into our hands.
'What is the nature of the Self?'
What exists in truth is the Self alone. The world, the individual soul and God are appearances in it.
Like silver in mother-of-pearl, these three appear at the same time and disappear at the same time.
The Self is that where there is absolutely no ‘I-thought’. That is called ‘Silence’. The Self itself is the
world; the Self itself is ‘I’; the Self itself is God; all is Siva, the Self.
Question: Before and after meditation I get many thoughts about the unhappy people of the world.

Bhagavan: First find out whether there is an ‘I’ in you or not. It is this ego ‘I’ [ahamkara] that gets these
thoughts and, as a result, you feel weakness. Therefore find out how identification with the body takes
place. Body consciousness is the cause of all misery. When you conduct the enquiry into the ego ‘I’, you
will find out its source and you will be able to remove it. After that there will be no more questions of
the type you are asking.

(The Power of the Presence, part one, p. 234)

Self-enquiry by following the clue of aham-vritti is just like the dog tracing its master by his scent.

The master may be at some distant, unknown place, but that does not at all stand in the way of the dog
tracing him. The master’s scent is an infallible clue for the animal, and nothing else, such as the dress he
wears, or his build and stature etc., counts.

The dog holds on to that scent undistractedly while searching for him, and finally it succeeds in tracing
him.

BHAGAVAN

Unless you give up the idea that the world is real, your mind will always be after it.

If you take the appearance to be real you will never know the Real itself, although it is the Real alone
that exists.
BHAGAVAN

D. - But you have often said that one must reject other thoughts when he begins the quest, but the
thoughts are endless; if one thought is rejected, another comes and there seems to be no end at all.

M. - I do not say that you must go on rejecting thoughts. If you cling to yourself, say the I-thought, and
when your interest keeps you to that single idea, other thoughts get rejected, automatically they vanish.

D. - And so rejection of thoughts is not necessary?

M. - No. It may be necessary for a time or for some. You fancy that there is no end if one goes on
rejecting every thought when it rises. No. There is an end. If you are vigilant, and make a stern effort to
reject every thought when it rises, you will soon find that you are going deeper and deeper into your
own inner self, where there is no need for your effort to reject the thoughts.

D. - Then it is possible to be without effort, without strain!

M. - Not only that, it is impossible for you to make an effort beyond a certain extent.

D. - I want to be further enlightened. Should I try to make no effort at all?

M. - Here it is impossible for you to be without effort. When you go deeper, it is impossible for you to
make any effort.

D. - Then I can dispense with outside help and by mine own effort get into the deeper truth by myself.

M. - True. But the very fact that you are possessed of the quest of the Self is a manifestation of the
Divine Grace. It is effulgent in the Heart, the inner being, the Real Self. It draws you from within. You
have to attempt to get in from without. Your attempt is Vichara (earnest-quest), the deep inner
movement is Grace. That is why I say there is no real Vichara without Grace, nor is there Grace active for
him who is without Vichara. Both are necessary.

Sat Darshana Bhashya

In raising this question "Who am I ??", if you notice the silence instead of looking for an answer, that
silence will dispense with the ego instantly.

Ramana Periya Puranam

Withdraw your mind completely from the world and turn it within, and abide there. If you keep awake
always to the Self which is the substratum of all experiences, you will find that the world which you are
now aware of is just as unreal as the world in which you lived in your dream.
Bhagavan.

There is no entity by name mind.

Because of the emergence of thoughts, we surmise something from which they start that we term mind.

When we probe to see what it is there is nothing like it.

After it has vanished, Peace will be found to remain eternal.

Sri Ramana Maharshi

"The universe is like a painting on a screen - the screen being the Red Hill, Arunachala. That which rises
and sinks is made up of what it rises from. The finality of the universe is the God Arunachala. Meditating
on Him or on the seer, the Self, there is a mental vibration ‘I’ to which all are reduced. Tracing the
source of ‘I’, the primal ‘I-I’ alone remains over, and it is inexpressible. The seat of Realisation is within
and the seeker cannot find it as an object outside him. That seat is bliss and is the core of all beings.
Hence it is called the Heart. The only useful purpose of the present birth is to turn within and realise it.
There is nothing else to do."

Bhagavan