DAY BY DAY WITH BHAGAVAN 1.Page.

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By giving up activities is meant giving up attachment to activities or the fruits thereof, giving up the notion I am the doer. The activities for going through which this body has come, will have to be gone through. There is no question of giving up such activities, whatever one may or may not like.
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That force, by whatever name you may call it, which brought the body into existence will see to it that the activities which this body is meant to go through are brought about. 3.Page.43 Dr. Srinivasa Rao asked Bhagavan, When we enquire within who am I? what is that? Bhagavan: It is the ego. It is only that which makes the vichara also. The Self has no vichara. That which makes the enquiry is the ego. The I about which the enquiry is made is also the ego. As the result of the enquiry the ego ceases to exist and only the Self is found to exist. 4.Page.55 In continuation of an old question of his with reference to a certain passage in Maha Yoga, he asked Bhagavan whether it was necessary and a condition precedent for a man to watch his breathing before beginning the mental quest Who am I? Bhagavan: All depends on a mans pakva, i.e., his aptitude and fitness. Those who have not the mental strength to concentrate or control their mind and direct it on the quest are advised to watch their breathing, since such watching will naturally and as a matter of course lead to cessation of thought and bring the mind under control. Breath and mind arise from the same place and when one of them is controlled, the other is also controlled. As a matter of fact, in the quest method which is more correctly Whence am I? and not merely Who am I? we are not simply trying to eliminate saying we are not the body, not the senses and so on, to reach what remains as the ultimate reality, but we are trying to find whence the I thought for the ego arises within us. The method contains within it, though implicitly and not expressly, the watching of the breath. When

we watch wherefrom the I-thought, the root of all thoughts, springs, we are necessarily watching the source of breath also, as the I-thought and the breath arise from the same source. Mr. Prasad again asked whether, for controlling breath, the regular pranayama is not better in which 1:4:2 proportion for breathing in, retaining, and breathing out is prescribed. Bhagavan replied, All those proportions, sometimes regulated not by counting but by uttering mantras, etc., are aids for controlling the mind. That is all. Watching the breath is also one form of pranayama. Retaining breath, etc., is more violent and may be harmful in some cases, e.g., when there is no proper Guru to guide the sadhak at every step and stage. But merely watching the breath is easy and involves no risk.

5.Pages.58&59 Dr. Srinivasa Rao asked whether after putting oneself the question Who am I? one should remain quiet or whether one should go on to give the answer, such as I am not this body, senses, etc. or whether one should go on repeating the question Who am I? Bhagavan: Why should you go on repeating Who am I? as if it is a mantra. If other thoughts arise, then the questions, To whom do these thoughts arise?, Whence does the I to which these thoughts come arise? have to be asked, i.e., to keep away other thoughts. Even in mantra japam, when the man fails to repeat the mantra, i.e., when other thoughts begin to occupy his mind, he reminds himself I have left off the mantra and begins repeating it. The object in all paths is to keep off all other thoughts except the thought of God or Self. 6.Page.80 Question 1: When I think Who am I?, the answer comes I am not this mortal body but I am chaitanya, atma, or paramatma. And suddenly another question arises Why has atma come into maya? or in other words Why has God created this world? Answer: To enquire Who am I? really means trying to find out the source of the ego or the I thought. You are not to think of other thoughts, such as I am not this body, etc. Seeking

the source of I serves as a means of getting rid of all other thoughts. We should not give scope to other thoughts, such as you mention, but must keep the attention fixed on finding out the source of the I thought, by asking (as each thought arises) to whom the thought arises and if the answer is I get the thought by asking further who is this I and whence its source? 7. Page.81 Question 3: I do not understand the meaning of brahma satyam jagat mithya (Brahman is real, the world is unreal). Does this world have real existence or not? Does the jnani not see the world or does he see it in a different form? Answer: Let the world bother about its reality or falsehood. Find out first about your own reality. Then all things will become clear. What do you care how the jnani sees the world? You realise yourself and then you will understand. The jnani sees that the world of names and forms does not limit the Self, and that the Self is beyond them.

8.Page.82 Then Mr. P.C. Desai quoted Bhagavans Upadesa Sara in Sanskrit to the effect, When you investigate the nature of mind continuously or without break, you find there is no such thing as the mind. This is the straight path for all. The visitor again asked, It is said in our scriptures that God it is that creates, sustains and destroys all and that He is immanent in all. If so and if God does everything and if all that we do is according to Gods niyati (law), and had already been planned in the Cosmic Consciousness. is there individual personality and any responsibility for it? Bhagavan: Of course, there is. The same scriptures have laid down rules as to what men should or should not do. If man is not responsible, then why should those rules have been laid down? You talk of Gods niyati and things happening according to it. If you ask God why this creation and all, He would tell you it is according to your karma again. If you believe in God and His niyati working out everything, completely surrender yourself to Him and there will be no responsibility for you. Otherwise find out your real nature and thus attain freedom. 9.Page.84 Question 2: Is soham the same as Who am I? Answer: Aham alone is common to them. One is soham.

The other is koham. They are different. Why should we go on saying soham? One must find out the real I. In the question Who am I?, by I is meant the ego. Trying to trace it and find its source, we see it has no separate existence but merges in the real I. 10.Page.87 Visitor: How has the unreal come? Can the unreal spring from the real? Bhagavan: See if it has sprung. There is no such thing as the unreal, from another standpoint. The Self alone exists. When you try to trace the ego, based on which alone the world and all exist, you find the ego does not exist at all and so also all this creation. 11.Page.87 & 88 When I entered the hall Bhagavan was already answering a question which, I gathered, was to the effect Is the theory of evolution true? and Bhagavan said, The trouble with all of us is that we want to know the past, what we were, and also what we will be in the future. We know nothing about the past or the future. We do know the present and that we exist now. Both yesterday and tomorrow are only with reference to today. Yesterday was called today in its time, and tomorrow will be called today by us tomorrow. Today is ever present. What is ever present is pure existence. It has no past or future. Why not try and find out the real nature of the present and ever-present existence ? 12.Page.89&90 Question 4: I dont understand what work I should do and what not. Answer: Dont bother. What is destined as work to be done by you in this life will be done by you, whether you like it or not. With reference to question 4, Mrs. P. C. Desai quoting the Bhagavad Gita asked Bhagavan, If (as Arjuna was told) there is a certain work destined to be done by each and we shall eventually do it however much we do not wish to do it or refuse to do it, is there any free will? Bhagavan said, It is true that the work meant to be done by us will be done by us. But it is open to us to be free from the joys or pains, pleasant or unpleasant consequences

of the work, by not identifying ourselves with the body or that which does the work. If you realise your true nature and know that it is not you that does any work, you will be unaffected by the consequences of whatever work the body may be engaged in according to destiny or past karma or divine plan, however you may call it. You are always free and there is no limitation of that freedom. 14.Page.88 Another visitor asked, The present is said to be due to past karma. Can we transcend the past karma by our free will now? Bhagavan: See what the present is, as I told you. Then you will understand what is affected by or has a past or a future and also what is ever-present and always free, unaffected by the past or future or by any past karma. 15.Page.91& 92. With reference to Bhagavans answer to Mrs. Desais question on the evening of 3-1-46, I asked him, Are only important events in a mans life, such as his main occupation or profession, predetermined, or are trifling acts in his life, such as taking a cup of water or moving from one place in the room to another, also predetermined? Bhagavan: Yes, everything is predetermined. I: Then what responsibility, what free will has man? Bhagavan: What for then does the body come into existence? It is designed for doing the various things marked out for execution in this life. The whole programme is chalked out. (Not an atom moves except by His Will) expresses the same truth, whether you say (Does not move except by His Will) or (Does not move except by karma). As for freedom for man, he is always free not to identify himself with the body and not to be affected by the pleasures or pains consequent on the bodys activities 16.Page.92 When I entered the hall Bhagavan was answering some question saying, There is no difference between dream and the waking state except that the dream is short and the waking long. Both are the result of the mind. Because the waking state

is long, we imagine that it is our real state. But, as a matter of fact, our real state is what is sometimes called turiya or the fourth state which is always as it is and knows nothing of the three avasthas, viz., waking, dream or sleep. Because we call these three avasthas we call the fourth state also turiya avastha. But it is not an avastha, but the real and natural state of the Self. When this is realised, we know it is not a turiya or fourth state, for a fourth state is only relative, but turiyatita, the transcendent state called the fourth state. 17.Page93 & 94 Our real nature is mukti. But we are imagining we are bound and are making various strenuous attempts to become free, while we are all the while free. This will be understood only when we reach that stage. We will be surprised that we were frantically trying to attain something which we have always been and are. An illustration will make this clear. A man goes to sleep in this hall. He dreams he has gone on a world tour, is roaming over hill and dale, forest and country, desert and sea, across various continents and after many years of weary and strenuous travel, returns to this country, reaches Tiruvannamalai, enters the Asramam and walks into the hall. Just at that moment he wakes up and finds he has not moved an inch but was sleeping where he lay down. He has not returned after great effort to this hall, but is and always has been in the hall. It is exactly like that. If it is asked, why being free we imagine we are bound, I answer, Why being in the hall did you imagine you were on a world adventure, crossing hill and dale, desert and sea? It is all mind or maya. Another visitor, who said that he was from Sri Aurobindos Ashram, asked Bhagavan: But we see pain in the world. A man is hungry. It is a physical reality. It is very real to him. Are we to call it a dream and remain unmoved by his pain? Bhagavan: From the point of view of jnana or the reality, the pain you speak of is certainly a dream, as is the world of which the pain is an infinitesimal part. In the dream also you yourself feel hunger. You see others suffering hunger. You feed yourself and, moved by pity, feed the others that you find suffering from hunger. So long as the dream lasted, all those pains were quite as real as you now think the pain you see in the world to be. It was only when you woke up that you discovered that the pain in the dream was unreal. You might have eaten to the full and gone to sleep. You dream that you work hard and long in the hot sun all day, are tired and hungry and want to eat a lot. Then you get up and find your stomach is full and you have not stirred out

of your bed. But all this is not to say that while you are in the dream you can act as if the pain you feel there is not real. The hunger in the dream has to be assuaged by the food in the dream. The fellow beings you found in the dream so hungry had to be provided with food in that dream. You can never mix up the two states, the dream and the waking state. Till you reach the state of jnana and thus wake out of this maya, you must do social service by relieving suffering whenever you see it. But even then you must do it, as we are told, without ahamkara, i.e., without the sense I am the doer, but feeling, I am the Lords tool. Similarly one must not be conceited, I am helping a man below me. He needs help. I am in a position to help. I am superior and he inferior. But you must help the man as a means of worshipping God in that man. All such service too is for the Self, not for anybody else. You are not helping anybody else, but only yourself. 18. Page.99 Mr. Mahatani asked Bhagavan, It is said in Advaita Bodha Deepika, that the Supreme Self identifying itself with the mind appears changeful. How can the mind coming from maya which itself comes from the Self be able to alter or change the changeless Self? Bhagavan answered, There is in reality no change, no creation. But for those who ask, How has this creation come about? the above explanation is given.
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Gokul Bhai read out the Gujarati Ramana Gita Chapter XI and then the Gujarati Upadesa Saram. Mr. P.C. Desai asked Bhagavan, In verse 14, they have translated the second line of the Sanskrit verse as If the mind is continuously fixed on meditation of the Self, etc. Is that all right, seeing that neither continuously nor Self is found in the original? Bhagavan: Eka chintana involves continuous thought. If no other thought is to come, the one thought has to be continuous. What is meant by the verse is as follows: The previous verses have said that for controlling the mind breathcontrol or pranayama may be helpful. This verse says that the mind so brought under control or to the state of laya should not be allowed to be in mere laya or a state like sleep, but that it should be directed towards eka chintana or one thought, whether that one thought is of the Self, the ishta devata or a mantram. What the one thought may be will depend on each mans pakva or fitness. The verse leaves it as one thought.

20.Page.173&174 The letter went on to say, Ramana Maharshi is an exponent of ajata doctrine of Advaita Vedanta. Of course it is a bit difficult. Bhagavan remarked on this, Somebody has told him so. I do not teach only the ajata doctrine. I approve of all schools. The same truth has to be expressed in different ways to suit the capacity of the hearer. The ajata doctrine says, Nothing exists except the one reality. There is no birth or death, no projection or drawing in, no sadhaka, no mumukshu, no mukta, no bondage, no liberation. The one unity alone exists ever. To such as find it difficult to grasp this truth and who ask, How can we ignore this solid world we see all around us?, the dream experience is pointed out and they are told, All that you see depends on the seer. Apart from the seer, there is no seen. This is called the drishti-srishti vada or the argument that one first creates out of his mind and then sees what his mind itself has created. To such as cannot grasp even this and who further argue, The dream experience is so short, while the world always exists. The dream experience was limited to me. But the world is felt and seen not only by me, but by so many, and we cannot call such a world non-existent, the argument called srishti-drishti vada is addressed and they are told, God first created such and such a thing, out of such and such an element, and then something else, and so forth. That alone will satisfy this class. Their mind is otherwise not satisfied and they ask themselves, How can all geography, all maps, all sciences, stars, planets and the rules governing or relating to them and all knowledge be totally untrue? To such it is best to say, Yes. God created all this and so you see it. Dr.M. said, But all these cannot be true; only one doctrine can be true. Bhagavan said, All these are only to suit the capacity of the learner. The absolute can only be one.
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