The disciple’s experience of the Master’s Grace, whereby he
gets spiritual awakening, is likened unto that of the elephant waking up from
sleep on seeing a lion in his dream. Just as the mere sight of the dream-lion
wakes up the elephant from his sleep, even so the mere gracious glance of the
Master dispels the disciple’s sleep of ignorance and awakens him to the Real.
All living beings desire to be happy always without misery.
To gain that happiness which is our nature and which is experience in the state
of deep sleep where there is no mind, one should know one’s self. For that the
path of knowledge, the enquiry of ‘who am I’ is the principal means.
The
man who has not experienced his own real Self, thinking ‘I am this body’, sees
himself as ‘I’, the first person of grammar. He sees another person whom he
calls ‘you’, and refers to third persons as ‘he’.
These
three distinct persons are not real. They are seen on account of the false
notion ‘I am the body’. When the ego-soul is lost as a result of the quest of
the real Self, only that Self, consciousness alone, will shine.
– Ramana Maharshi
– Ramana Maharshi