Talk:Self-enquiry (Ramana Maharshi)

PLEASE DO NOT DO WHOLE SCALE DELETE/REVERT
Arunachalesha 15:51, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
 * 1) Please discuss on this talk page before making deletions
 * 2) This content should only be edited/altered/deleted by people who have studied the relevant works and who practice Self-enquiry regularly.
 * 3) Please do not delete on the grounds that this should NOT be an instruction manual. I have checked other meditations such as Vipassana, anapanasati etc, they are all represented in detail. Thus, Self-enquiry has every right to be proprly represented.

Sri Nisargadatta (Niz) also.
praps Niz can also be mentioned. Abiding in the "I am" is similar to the self-awareness. He also talks a lot in "I am THat" about enquiry/vichara.

Would like you to add the names of books where details can be found. e.g Be as you are, Sadhu Oms book, Micheal L's website. (btw, i am quite new to the practice of SE, so i dont want to modify the actual content, just supplement it with references and other material. Arunachalesha 05:41, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Mental contact
I concur he did strongly point towards finding the Guru within, however, I don't feel comfortable with the current phrasing of this introductory sentence unless it is your belief Ramana said that Satsang should ONLY be mentally, i.e. that one should not sit with a guru in the flesh.

You seem much better versed then I, so if that is your understanding of what Ramana taught, I have no contention with it... it just seems off to me. Sethie 05:41, 2 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I didn't see the sentence as implying ONLY. But he certainly didn't want anyone relying on the physical form.

Yes, there is many references where he dissuaded seekers from relying on the physical guru, telling them that the guru is within (the Self). As an example, he sent many serious seekers away from the ashram to meditate in the sadhu colony (palakottu) (e.g., Annamalai Swamy, Ramanatha Brahmachari). He told seekers that the guru's body will perish, his attendants won't let you touch his feet. so seek the (real) guru within. He kept insisting that the body we thought was Ramana, was not him. One of his quotes is: "The true Bhagavan resides in your Heart as your true Self. This is who I truly am. " I hope i have got your point, and addressed it.


 * OK, now i have DG's 'BE as You are' on the Chapter 9, titled 'Silence and Satsanga'

Page 107: Contact with the Guru is also necessary, but this means spiritual contact. If the disciple finds the guru internally, then it does not matter where he goes. Staying here or elsewhere must be understood to be the same and have the same effect.


 * On Page 100, "This flow of power from the Guru can be recvd by anyone whose attention is focussed on the Self or on the form of the Guru, distance is no impediment to its efficacy. ... Traditionally, it involves being in the physical presence of the guru, but sri ramana gave it a much wider definition. He said that the most important element in sat-sanga was the mental connection with the Guru. " (DG's source is Paul Brunton's Conscious Immortality, p151-2)


 * So Ramana is not saying "Dont sit with me" but assuring disciples that no matter where they are, the grace of the Self is there, and that they should not rely on his physical presence.

Perhaps we can look at the wording. Arunachalesha 10:02, 2 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the reply, you did get my point and address it.


 * For me, When I read "in the form of mental contact with a realized Guru," for me, it excludes physical contact with a guru.


 * I like DG's phrasing. Could we say something like "RM stressed that for nearly everyone, contact with a guru, an enlightened being was essential, however, he stated it was not neccesary to be in the physical presence of the guru, that one could find the guru inside onself or connect/contact the guru mentally"?Sethie 15:40, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Confusing phrasing for me
I can't really make heads or tails of this: "Practice (Awareness Watching Awareness Approach): Sri Ramana stated that:" (last paragraph before misconceptions). Sethie 05:44, 2 May 2007 (UTC)


 * If the title confuses you, we can reword it. If the entire para confuses you, we can consider rewording/removing it. Some people (one Michael L) has spoken of "I AM" as too confusing for him, whereas "awareness" or "awareness watching awareness" makes sense to him. Frankly, with me, it's the other way round! Thanks, for pointing this, and other point out.


 * BTW, there's going to be a lot of additions and deletions going on for some time. So you might consider taking a nap and checking in a week! Arunachalesha 10:16, 2 May 2007 (UTC)


 * The only thing that confuses me is what I put in quotes "Practice (AWA Approach): Sri Ramana stated that."


 * As for taking a week off....I have the desire to participate and collaborate and possibly.... add some material. :)


 * I am wondering if there is a way I could do that other then just stopping all my work right now?Sethie 15:45, 2 May 2007 (UTC)


 * If Ramana stated "You are awareness", then there is NO way that awareness can watch awareness. That is praps why i have been uncomfortabel with Michael Langford AWA. However, i would like others views on this, i dont want to push my opinion. Thanks for pointing this out, Seth. Arunachalesha 16:57, 2 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Arunachalesha, I have carefully read Langford's book and found it interesting and inspiring, but when I tried to follow his instructions, I kept returning to the sense that Awareness cannot watch Awareness. Then today I re-read this line in Be As You Are: "Beginners in self-enquiry were advised by Sri Ramana to put their attention on the feeling of 'I' and to hold that feeling as long as possible" and it suddenly seemed to me that THIS is what Langford is talking about. His choice of words, though, confuses things. If he were to use the term "Attention on Awareness" rather that "Awareness watching Awareness" (which I think is perhaps what he actually means), his book and recommendations might much more sense. His work is quite controversial, so I am not sure whether we should include it here or not. I suppose the question is, does it add more clarity, or more confusion? ... perhaps if we put in context, it could help undermine some of the common misconceptions about SE by forcing/urging people to consider this more deeply?
 * Your work on this SE page is much appreciated. Let's keep working on this to clarify this easy-sounding but often misunderstood practice. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Iddli (talk • contribs) 01:56, 3 May 2007 (UTC).


 * Wowsa. I am a big fan of his book and for some reason, the semantics don't cause problems for me. For me, AWA has been the clearest expression of what I think Ramana asks us to do- attend to the sense of I.


 * I asked that the refference be taken out not because of objections to Langford, but just the insertion of the phrase AWA in the middle of a sentence. Sethie 02:52, 3 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Short of time for now. Good dialogue here now, seems like attention to the task at hand. Some comments on the above. Iddli is correct, and Sethie seems to find Langford valuable, and I agree with Arunachalesha that Langford's semantics can be an obstacle to many at first glance. So let's explore that further.


 * First, the purpose of: Sri Ramana stated that: "The Truth is that Self is constant and unintermittent Awareness. The object of enquiry is to find the true nature of the Self as Awareness. Let one practise enquiry so long as separateness is perceived." And that: "You are awareness. Awareness is another name for you. Since you are awareness there is no need to attain or cultivate it. All that you have to do is to give up being aware of other things, that is of the not-self. If one gives up being aware of them then pure awareness alone remains, and that is the Self." ., was to illustrate in simple terms the theoretical basis of both true self enquiry, and what Langford suggests by "Awareness watching Awareness" or what Sri Ganesan (Sri Ramana's Grand Nephew who spent many early years in his presence) calls (which I think for many is far clearer) ‘attention attending to attention', as a better way of looking at what Sri Ramana meant by self-enquiry. It could use some expanding to make the relationship with self-enquiry more clear than it is.


 * Langford explains how this insight came to him here:, and that may help explain how the phrase came about. When you transcend semantics, it seems that one could say that true self enquiry which is more like feeling attention to the sense of self or the I am sense is based in the same principle, and that is why Sri Ramana said self-enquiry worked by gradually separating the sense of self from objects, so that the underlying Awareness or Self was revealed as the only thing that survived. It is not that Langford was the first to discover this approach, or to note that Sri Ramana said enquiry was more of a feeling attention than a thought process and that the Self was Awareness, but rather, that he has done a lot to show that even though the more mental approach which is widely considered to be self enquiry has become so well known that most assume that IS self enquiry, there is good reason to believe it is not what Sri Ramana intended. It is important to emphasize that this mysterious Self is, according to Sri Ramana and others of that school, only Awareness itself and not some mental egoic projection nor limited to the body, as Ramana demonstrated in his death experience.


 * Secondly, the point Sri Ramana makes is that there are really no ajnanis, only those who misidentify with the self rather than remain aware of the Self, and the point is to become aware of the so-called inner guru which is really neither within or without and is actually the transendental Self or Awareness, which is THE Guru, the outer form merely an impermanent catalytic and symbolic agent, thus he said "mental contact is best", and THAT is the satsang he refers to. At that level of practice, whether or not one is in the physical presence of a Jnani (or agents if necessary), the process continues. That is why Langford (among others, including Sri Ramana) pointed out that belief the guru was physical could be an obstacle to gaining the full benefits of satsang.


 * Finally, it is more accurate to say that Ramana did nothing volitionally during his death experience, it was demonstrated by the direct intervention of the Self. As Godman says here "...I say 'without effort' because this re-enactment of death and the subsequent self-enquiry seemed to be something that happened to him, rather than something he did. When he described this event for his Telugu biographer, the pronoun 'I' never appeared. He said, 'The body lay on the ground, the limbs stretched themselves out,' and so on. That particular description really leaves the reader with the feeling that this event was utterly impersonal. Some power took over the boy Venkataraman, made him lie on the floor and finally made him understand that death is for the body and for the sense of individuality, and that it cannot touch the underlying reality in which they both appear." Practices are not the point but merely to get to this point, and the virtue of true self-enquiry, properly understood, is that it seems from all accounts to establish a direct mental link to the Self more easily, thus accelerating liberation, compared with other methods. So, to the extent Langford aids in clarifying what self-enquiry actually is and is not and has sourced his conclusions, which I think is part of an accurate encyclopedic article, I'd like to see some summary mention of "his" approach included in the discussion. But I agree the sematics of understanding the phrase 'Awareness watching Awareness' can be an obstacle, and I would also include Sri Ganesan's language to make it clearer that it is "Attention" to Awareness that is meant. Hopefully we can agree that to the extent Sri Ramana's teachings are most accurately presented in their true form and widespread misconceptions are confronted, we have done a service to Wikipedia and those inclined to that type of approach, without creating just a "fan site" like some articles have become. Let's be patient here, and create an first class article worthy of feature from one that was, shall we say, less than accurate and informative. --Dseer 04:28, 3 May 2007 (UTC)


 * As I understand, the word 'watching' in the phrase "Awareness watching Awareness" seems to indicate an action being performed by Awareness(which is what one is). I would like to suggest the phrase "Awareness aware of Awareness". A being-verb fits better here than a doing-verb. Using a doing-verb was probably what caused some confusion. --Ramprax (talk) 07:22, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Proposed page move
Using google searches, I checked on "self inquiry" "Self enquiry" "Self-enquiry" and "self-inquiry"

Self inquiry brought back the most results, by a large #... and it looks like "enquiry" is spelled wrong.

Unless anyone strongly objects, I will move the page to "self inquiry." Sethie (talk) 06:07, 26 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Self-enquiry is not misspelled. It is the British spelling, which is also the spelling commonly used in India ... the source texts we are drawing upon in the article use the self-enquiry spelling. If we can have "self-inquiry" and "self inquiry" etc redirected to this page, that seems preferable to having the page name spelled one way, and all the references to self-enquiry spelled differently through the article. For the moment I will add in the American spelling in the first sentence. My question is: if we have a page redirect (from self-inquiry, etc) and the alternate spelling appears in the opening sentence, will a google search pick up the wikipedia article if someone googles self-inquiry? (Iddli (talk) 06:26, 26 January 2008 (UTC))


 * Thanks for the heads up on English spellings!


 * Personaly, 80,000 google hits with "self inquiry" vs 5,000 google hits at "self-enquiry" makes it an open and shut case for me.


 * I feel the pull to drop it for now. Do as you will. Sethie (talk) 03:11, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Scope of article and content about traditional Vedanta
I think that there are two problems with this article that are easily fixed. I also have a third point that may or may not be a problem but thought I would point out anyway.

1) This article is all about what Ramana Maharshi calls self enquiry (and maybe it applies to some other modern teachers too). The term atma vichara is also used in traditional Advaita Vedanta where it refers to the entire method of the Vedanta and this is not discussed in this article (and in principle, this should be just covered by the Advaita Vedanta page since Advaita Vedanta is atma vichara according to the traditional view - though the Advaita Vedanta page is not that great). Perhaps this page can be titled "Self-Enquiry (Ramana Maharshi)" or something to that effect. As given, it makes it seem like everyone thinks this is what atma vichara is.

2) The discussion of sadhana in traditional Vedanta (found in the misconceptions section of this article) is also wrong in the sense of not conforming to what traditional Vedantins actually hold. For example, no Advaita Vedantin holds that repeating the mahavakya as a mantra is the practice of Advaita Vedanta, etc. The traditional Advaita Vedanta view is opposed to the combination of action and knowledge and this is also true with respect to mental actions. Statements such as "Hinduism call this practice ["neti neti"] self-enquiry" is also very problematic. I think it would be fine (and also simple) to just not make claims about Vedanta, Hinduism, etc. and just point out the misconceptions (if the misconceptions belong in the article at all). The purpose of this article should not be to introduce misconceptions about Vedanta (or anything else for that matter).

3) I do not too much about Ramana Maharshi's teachings but I find the crux of this article dubious in any case. What I get out of it is that Ramana Maharshi thought that mental practices cannot lead to knowledge so he gave some kind of special non-mental practice/technique that is better than existing mental techniques. In addition to being a bit silly, my limited readings on Ramana Maharshi's talks suggest that this explanation is wildly missing the point. Someone who understands his teachings well should look into this more carefully. In any case, as I said I don't know Ramana Maharshi's teachings too well and the article may be just fine (I would be very surprised though). My main points are 1 and 2 above.

- RS. User:Rrs wiki 5 june 2012


 * you've got a very valuable point at point 1. It's typical of the Advaita Vedanta interpretation of Ramana Maharshi by some of his devotees. I'll inquire further into it. Best regards,  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   07:24, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
 * ad 1: I've added a comment by David Frawley, and a reference to the Yoga Vasishta;
 * ad 2: I've removed the whole section; it was unsourced, and indeed at odds with traditional Advaita Vedanta;
 * ad 3: actually, Ramana's explanations on "self-enquiry" semm to be close to thet tarditional practice of "atma-vichara", and may even have been influenced by his reading of the Yoga Visashta. What Ramana said is that "mind" (vritti?) is connected to the I-thought; the I-thought, which comes up from the vasanas, creates all the 'movements and unrest' of the mind (compare shankaras and kleshas?). When the I-thought is seen-through, and one stays in the notion/conscious of "being", eventually all the vasanas will be removed, and the I-thought will cease forever. Yes, there are differences with Advaita vedanta; AV is about undertsanding the texts, while Ramana's teachings are about direct understanding. I hope that the notion that "he gave some kind of special non-mental practice/technique that is better than existing mental techniques" has been removed by now, and that the article has become more neutral. Best regards,  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   12:43, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

Just wondering why a book reference was deleted
I tried to add Michael James' book Happiness and the Art of Being to Further Reading and added a link to the free pdf of the book to External Links, As the book is written by a Westerner who spent a lot of time with Bhagavan's "in-body" devotees, I thought it might be helpful for readers as a supplement to Bhagavan's own words and the words of these devotees. However my addition was deleted on the same day that I made it. Just wondering why, so I'll know better what types of editing are considered helpful. Thanks to all who are working on this page! Om Namo Bhagavate Sri Ramanaya — Preceding unsigned comment added by Innerinstitute (talk • contribs) 01:27, 6 November 2013 (UTC) Innerinstitute (talk) 01:35, 6 November 2013 (UTC)

External links modified
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