Introduction:

When reading the teachings of Sri Ramana or texts referring to them written by his disciples, it is worth familiarizing yourself with the meaning of some key concepts used in these works, which often have a completely different meaning than the popular ones assigned to them in other philosophical and spiritual systems. Interpreting Bhagavan's teachings based on definitions taken from other systems – or worse, from the popular understanding of the same terms – can lead to incorrect conclusions.
Furthermore, in his teachings, Sri Ramana significantly deepened and clarified several important concepts of Advaita Vedanta, so even using Advaita Vedanta definitions does not guarantee a correct understanding of the essence of Sri Ramana's teachings.

Because of this, we have compiled explanations of several basic terms used in the teachings of Ramana and his disciples that appear on our website, which are particularly prone to misinterpretation. We hope that this will help to avoid incorrect interpretations when reading the texts.

It should be remembered that in some conversations with Bhagavan that have been recorded and published, Sri Ramana adapted his teaching to the understanding and level of the pilgrim asking the question. It may therefore have happened that in such situations he used language and concepts that were understandable to the person concerned, and that certain phrases may in such circumstances have taken on a meaning different from their deepest, essential meaning. This should be taken into account by not treating such teachings as the essence of Sri Ramana's teaching, but only as a teaching intended and relevant only for specific, not yet spiritually mature individuals, expressed in a way appropriate for them, using concepts that they could grasp.

We also stipulate that some of the concepts used in the teachings presented on our website are very difficult — or even impossible — to define in words, so the descriptions of these terms proposed here are only an attempt at a more or less imperfect explanation of the essence of what lies behind these words.

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The Fourth State [Turiya] – Just as a large open space becomes three separate parts when two dividing walls are erected in it, similarly, when two types of imaginative identification with the body appear — namely, identification with the waking body and the dreaming body — our indivisible Self-Consciousness seems to become three states: waking, dreaming, and deep sleep.

When both walls of waking and dreaming are broken down through Atma-vichara, our limitless, one and natural Self-Consciousness is experienced as a pure, adjuncts-free state, similar to a great open space. Since it is experienced as a new state, completely different from the three states experienced so far (waking, dreaming, and deep sleep), it is called the “fourth state” [Turiya] in the scriptures.

However, when, through the permanently established experience of the natural state of the Self [sahaja atma sthita], the knowledge arises: “This state is nothing other than our eternal, natural state”, and when waking, dreaming, and deep sleep are recognized as unreal, the name ‘fourth’ or “Turiya” loses its meaning, because this state will not be experienced as something new. Therefore, the non-dual, eternal Self-Consciousness cannot be called the fourth state [Turiya] either. For this reason, the scriptures have called it “Turiyatita” - the transcendental state (the state transcending Turiya: the fifth state).

However, all these distinctions and classifications of states are merely verbal — Jnani's experience is one mere consciousness of Self-existence, which is beyond all states.

Sri Ramana says the following on this subject [Guru Vachaka Kovai]:

"The difference between the first three dense states [waking, dream and sleep] and the fourth and fifth states [turiya and turiyatita] are [accepted in sastras] only for those who are not able to tear away the dark ignorance of sleep and to immerse and abide firmly in the effulgent turiya [the state of Self]".

Ego - in Ulladu Narpadu Sri Ramana defines the ego as follows:

The insentient body does not say (or feel) ‘I’. Existence consciousness (sat-chit, the real Self) does not rise (or subside). (But) in between (these two) an ‘I’ rises as the measure of the body that is in between the body and the real Self a limited ‘I’ – consciousness in the form ‘I am this body rises in waking and subsides again in sleep). Know this (‘I am the body’ – consciousness) is (what is called by various names such as) the knot between consciousness and the insentient (chit-jada-granthi), bondage (bandha), the individual soul (jiva), subtle body (sukshma sarira), ego (ahantai), this mundane state of activity (samsara) and mind (manas).

In Nan Yar? he says:

The thought ‘I’ is indeed the first thought of the mind; that itself is the ego (ahankara).

This and only this definition of the ego is correct and useful from the point of view of the teachings of Bhagavan Ramana (and Advaita).

All other definitions that differ from the one presented here — including the Freudian definition, which considers the ego to be one of three personality structures, the one derived from psychology which defines the ego as egoism, i.e., excessive or exclusive love of oneself, and even more so the various popular definitions that consider the ego to be mere selfishness, egocentrism, egotism, narcissism, megalomania, etc. – are, in this view incorrect, useless, and accepting them is almost a guarantee of getting lost on the direct path.

Many people who practice and promote - often sincerely and with good intentions - Eastern spiritual philosophy and various practices that they believe will destroy the ego, adopt incorrect definitions of the ego, most often mistakenly equating the Western psychological definition of egoism and the Eastern definition of the ego, with the result that all the knowledge they convey is burdened with a fundamental error, and therefore cannot be effective on the difficult path of ego annihilation.

Still others — often convinced that they have found the golden mean between destroying the ego and being controlled by it — claim that the ego does not need to be destroyed at all, but rather “educated”, loved”, “tamed”, “programmed”, etc., so that instead of causing trouble, it becomes a useful tool in life. Unfortunately, in the light of Sri Ramana’s teachings, this approach is totally incorrect.

Since the ego — which rules all our thinking — fears its own demise, it directs and creates thoughts, ideas, concepts, beliefs, and opinions that help it continue its illusion of being real and protect it from termination. One of the basic and extremely effective survival strategies created by the ego, ensuring its protection from annihilation, is to suggest to adepts erroneous definitions of the ego and encourage them to use these definitions.

The Sanskrit word “ahamkara”, most often used to refer to the ego, was formed from the combination of the noun “aham” [I, self] with the particle “kara”, meaning ‘doing’ or “performing”. The word “ahamkara” can therefore be translated as “considering oneself the performer of actions”, “the feeling of being the doer”, “the feeling of being the agent of the action”; the suffix “kara” thus transforms the true I [aham] into the ego [ahamkara].
From a practical point of view, this approach can be extended to other feelings: the feeling of being an experiencer, a responsible one, etc., all of which are characteristic of the ego, and their presence indicates “living from the ego level”.

Guru - over the past few decades, this word has become so popular that it has become a permanent fixture in the pop culture lexicon and is used in a variety of contexts. The word “guru” refers to a spiritual teacher, but it is also used to describe leaders of various sects, martial arts masters, experts, or mentors in specific fields. The entertainment industry and Hollywood have also contributed to the modern meaning of the term, most often through parody or ridicule of “gurus” and casting various comedians in their roles. The 20th-century fashion for Eastern spirituality was also significant in this context, bringing with it a wave of magicians of various kinds posing as minor or major gurus. All of this, poured into the minds of Western societies by the mass media, cemented the new, mostly pejorative meaning of the word “guru” and caused a significant discord between what is actually understood by this concept in India and what the word commonly means in our culture today.

Many adepts embarking on spiritual paths have also adopted this modern pop-definition of the word “guru”. However, accepting such a colloquial understanding of the word “guru” is not only incorrect from the point of view of Indian tradition, but it can also significantly hinder one's progress on the spiritual path.

In the traditional sense, the term “guru” should not be used in most of the above cases. An expert in a particular field is not a guru; a person with vast knowledge and so-called life wisdom is not a guru; a sect leader is not a guru; someone with charisma and numerous admirers is not a guru; a spiritual teacher, even if extremely experienced and knowledgeable, is not yet a guru; those who have appointed themselves “gurus” are also usually not gurus.

So who is the Guru?

The Sanskrit word “guru” consists of two syllables: “gu” meaning “darkness” and ‘ru’ meaning “that which dispels”. Therefore, a Guru is one who dispels the darkness of ignorance, whereby ignorance is not simply a lack of relative knowledge in a particular discipline, but ignorance in relation to the Self and the identification of the Self with what it is not – the body, the mind, the personal "I". A Guru is one who leads from the dark depths of the realm of the ego to the light of the realm of the Self. A Guru is one who has realized the Self, the non-dual Atman-Brahman Oneness, and remains permanently established in the transcendental state [Turiyatita], leading others to it. The guru is Pure Consciousness, completely free from ego and all impurities. Only such a Guru can dispel the darkness and remove the veils of the adept, leading him to the same state in which he himself abides: the state of realization of Oneness with the Supreme. Even a teacher of the highest intelligence and vast experience is not sufficient for this – if he has not realized the Self, he cannot lead others to this state.

Since Reality is Sat, such a realized Guru is otherwise called Sat-Guru [Satguru, Sadguru].

Sat-Guru can manifest in the body and use it to lead disciples to Pure Consciousness, or do so without the body; whether in the body or without it, Sat-Guru constantly transcends the manifested world and all other worlds and remains beyond their conditionings (although to those around him it may seem that he is subject to them like everyone else). As long as Sat-Guru manifests in the body, he is Sat-Chit-Ananda-nama-rupa [existence-consciousness-bliss-name-form] (nama-rupa are aspects that do not have real existence, mentioned here only from the adept's point of view), and when he abandons the physical form, the unreal aspects of nama-rupa fall away and he remains as Sat-Chit-Ananda. Sat-Guru is the embodiment of the highest Truth.

Yoga adepts are sometimes told in class that a guru is unnecessary because “the guru is within you”, which is undoubtedly true, but they forget to add that “the guru within you” is usually covered by thick veils that effectively block contact with the inner Guru. Hence the need for an external Guru who helps and instructs on how to dispel the veils and effectively establish contact with the inner Guru - the Self.

As Sri Muruganar writes, according to Shiva Siddhanta there are three impurities that prevent the attainment of the ultimate goal, i.e., oneness with Shiva's consciousness: ego, karma, and Maya.
Those who are affected by all three impurities need a Guru in human form to realize the Self. Those who are affected only by ego and karma need only Shiva to appear before them. Those who are affected only by Maya are able to realize the oneness of Atman-Brahman through the power of the Self within, without the need for a Guru in human form or even a darshan of God. Because adepts belonging to the second and third categories are rare, so much emphasis is placed on the necessity of being guided by a Guru in human form. However, it is important to recall - what we write following Sadhu Om on the site dedicated to Sri Ramana – in the case of Ramana Maharshi's disciples, this role can be successfully fulfilled by the handwritten, reliable teachings of Satguru Sri Ramana.

The only known to us and reported case of achieving Self-realization [Liberation, Moksha] without the help of an external Guru living in the body is that of Sri Ramana Maharshi.

Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi is such a realized Guru, Sat-Guru, also called Loka Maha Guru, which means “Great Guru of the Whole World” to emphasize that his teaching and influence are not limited to a selected group of people, such as Brahmins or Hindus, and that his character and teaching are groundbreaking.

The word Guru or Satguru is most often used on our website to refer to Sri Ramana Maharshi and as a synonym for the Self, God, Brahman, Reality. In rare cases, to refer to people who aspire to be gurus or claim to be gurus without having the proper qualifications, depending on the context, terms such as “beginner guru”, “pop guru”, or “pseudo-guru” are used.

(For the sake of accuracy, it should be mentioned that Indian scriptures such as the Guru Gita list several different categories of gurus, from the lowest to the highest, but they are of little relevance when considering Sri Ramana's direct path, so we have not included this classification and gradation here).

Ignorance - ajnana, non-Jnana, lack of knowledge of one's own Self as it is; taking the mind-ego as one's Self; cognitive ignorance. A person who takes the ego for themselves is ajnani - someone immersed in the darkness of ignorance. In many of the spiritual texts found on our website, such a person - before truly knowing [realizing] the Self - is referred to as ignorant (in relation to the Self). This is not ignorance in the colloquial sense of the word, nor is it meant to belittle anyone.

In the light of Ramana Maharshi's teachings, as he himself said, taking the unreal for the real and the real for the unreal is ignorance.

In verse 1206 of Guru Vachaka Kovai, Sri Bhagavan says that the feeling of “I am this body” is ignorance, and it is in this sense that the word is used in his teachings and on our website. In the context of Sri Ramana's teachings, anyone who holds this belief is ignorant.

Self [Atman] – No words, however refined, can convey the nature of the Self, the Absolute Reality.

In one of his talks, when Bhagavan Ramana was asked what the Self is, he said the following [Day by day with Bhagavan]:

"The Self is not something of which jnana or ajnana can be predicated. It is beyond ajnana and jnana. The Self is the Self; that is all that can be said of it".

Trying however, to more or less imperfectly approximate its meaning, we can say that the true Self or true “I” is not – contrary to the feeling that is tangible to all of us – an experience of individuality, but rather an impersonal, all-pervading Pure Consciousness. The true Self is not the personal self to which we commonly refer in everyday life, which essentially has no real existence, but is a veil over the real experience of the true Self and must be necessarily cast off. The True Self is always present and always experienced, but a person is only continuously aware of it — as it truly is — when the veils that conceal it, the limiting tendencies of the mind, are destroyed.

This state is called Self-realization — it is an unchanging, permanent, impossible-to-veil state of Self-Consciousness (swarupa). The experience of the Self that is limited in time and occurs during practice (or sometimes in other circumstances) is called aham sphurana — a foretaste of the Self.

Various terms are used to describe different aspects of the Self, some of which are presented below for a better understanding of the essence of things. However, we would like to point out that neither any of these terms individually nor all of them together fully convey what Absolute Reality really is.

The following terms are sometimes used in reference to the Self to describe:

Swarupa, Atma Swarupa – its nature of the Self
Shiva, Sadashiva – its Parama Shiva nature
Shivahood, Shivam – the nature of Shiva
Kevalam, Kaivalya – its transcendental nature
Brahman, Tat, This – its traditional names from the Upanishads
Parama, Param – its nature of the Supreme
Jnana – its nature as true [non-dual] Knowledge
Mouna, Silence – its nature of Silence
Arul, Grace – its nature of Grace
God, the Supreme – its nature of God
Padam - its nature of abiding at the feet of the Supreme
Ulladu, Unmai, Mey – its nature of Reality
Ullam, Akam, Hridayam – its nature of the Heart
Puranam, Purnam – its nature of perfection, fullness
Paripuranam – its all-pervading nature
Sat-Chit-Ananda – its nature of Being-Consciousness-Happiness
Turiya – its nature of transcending the three states: waking, dreaming, and deep sleep
Turiyatita – its nature of transcendence even of the fourth state; the transcendental state
Natural state – its character of our true nature

The Sanskrit term Sat-Chit-Ananda is often used to describe the Self, most commonly translated as existence-consciousness-bliss (or being-consciousness-bliss or existence/being-consciousness-happiness). Sri Ramana teaches that the Self is pure existence, the awareness of “I am” completely devoid of the sense of “this” or “that”. The Self is only Pure Consciousness of existence/being. The direct experience of this Pure Consciousness is a state of undisturbed happiness/bliss, which is why the word “ananda” is also used to describe it (although Ramana Maharshi sometimes shortened this phrase to Sat-Chit, skipping the word Ananda).
These three — existence/being, consciousness, and happiness/bliss — are experienced as a single whole, rather than as three separate attributes of the Self. They are as inseparable as the three qualities of water: wetness, fluidity, and transparency.

On our website, the following terms are used as synonyms for the Self: Atman, Jnana, Mey-Jnana, Guru, Sat Guru, Jnani, God, Absolute, Supreme, Highest, true Self, Shiva, Grace, Knowledge, Consciousness, Pure Consciousness, Knowledge-Consciousness, Self-Consciousness, Reality, Truth, Heart, Padam, Natural State, Sahaja samadhi, Sahaja nirvikalpa samadhi, Love, Para-bhakti.

[Mey] Jnana or True/Real Knowledge - the word “jnana” has the same Indo-European roots as the English word “know” and is therefore sometimes understood as relative knowledge obtained through the senses. However, in Eastern spirituality, it is generally used to refer to direct spiritual knowledge that is beyond the senses and the mind, and it is in this context that Sri Ramana Maharshi uses it.

Describing the essence of True Knowledge, Sri Ramana says [Upadesa Undiyar]: „The knowledge which is devoid of both knowledge and ignorance, alone is [real] knowledge. This is the truth, because in the state of Self-experience there is nothing to know [other than Self] ”.

This knowledge should not be confused with “understanding” or any relative/subject-specific knowledge that is acquired and used in the order of triad: knower-knowing-known. Such knowledge is not True/Real Knowledge.

The experience of the Self is called Jnana or True/Real Knowledge. However, this does not mean that there is a knower and something separate from him that is known; the knowledge of the Self is non-dual. True knowledge – Jnana – is not the experience of an object different from the experiencer, nor is it the understanding of anything; it is the direct awareness of Reality, in which objects and the subject perceiving them have ceased to “exist”. One who is permanently established in this state is a Jnani (or, in other words, a realized sage).

Grace [Arul] - In order that the jivas [souls] should not have even the least difficulty in knowing and attaining him, God exists and shines due to his infinite Grace in each and every jiva, not as another but only as Self, the reality of those jivas.

The first-person consciousness “I am” is experienced by everyone. This consciousness of our own existence is within us only because God, through his infinite Grace, resides within us as the Self. Therefore, God always and continuously bestows his Grace on everyone and everyone in the form of the consciousness “I am”.

Since the shining of the “I am” consciousness is the greatest aid enabling jivas to attain God and thus giving them salvation, this consciousness is God's Grace. Therefore, it is a mistake to accuse God of being ungracious towards jivas; on the contrary, since jivas never direct their attention to the Self (the existence-consciousness that always shines as “I am”) but constantly direct it to external objects of the second and third persons, God cannot be accused of being ungracious, but only jivas (for turning away from His Grace).

God unceasingly bestows his Grace by constantly shining day and night in the hearts of all jivas in the form of the unbroken light of “I am I” [I-I], but until the jivas turn inward toward God and and attend to him, they will not be able to know the truth that God is unceasingly bestowing his Grace upon them and draw from it in abundance.

Bhagavan says [Guru Vachaka Kovai]:

„Since, the Lord is always and everywhere bestowing His Grace upon everyone by shining in them as ‘I am’] jivas stand immersed in the ambrosial flood of Grace; [when it is so, their] being deluded and suffering through illusion is foolishness, [just like one’s] dying [because of] not knowing how to quench [one’s] thirst [even though one is] standing in the midst of the flood of water of the rushing river Ganga”.

One who stands neck-deep in the Ganges need only bow his head to drink the water and quench his thirst. Similarly, since God constantly bestows his Grace upon us, shining within us as “I am”, all we need to do is turn our attention inward toward that “I am” to drink the divine ambrosia and satisfy our thirst for his Grace.

Bhagavan therefore gives simple advice: to satisfy your thirst and get Grace in abundance, you just need to turn within to the “I am”, which is always the shining Grace of God.

However, we have no right to complain about the lack of God's grace if we turn away from it by focusing our attention on external objects. Satisfying your thirst with sensual objects is like satisfying your thirst with a glass of salt water — afterwards, you will only be even more thirsty.

Sage - a sage in Eastern philosophy is not the same as a sage in Western philosophy. In the Advaita system, this term refers to a man who has attained the highest state possible for a human being, Oneness with the Supreme, the Self-realization. Being a realized sage is more than being a yogi or a saint. A sage is one who has irrevocably broken the bonds of karma, resides in the Turiya state, and no longer belongs to the order of the world of phenomena, although as long as his body lives, he may be taken for that body by those around him. A synonym for the word sage is the word Jnani.

However, we advise those listening to or reading about realized teachers to be vigilant, as in other spiritual traditions the term “realization” is used to describe inferior states of “understanding” or “insight” that are not equal to “Self-realization” in the Advaita sense, so that someone who is “realized” according to another philosophical-spiritual system may still be only a pretender to “Self-realization” in the Advaita Vedanta sense.

Silence [Mouna] – The term Silence or Mouna in Sri Ramana's teachings should not be understood as simply not uttering words. Mouna is the unmoved, thought-free state of Silence [Stillness] that characterizes Jnana.

The term “Mouna” is derived from the word “muni” meaning sage, and describes the state that a realized sage is in. This state can be “felt” by the adept in the presence of the sage, so the term in particular illustrates the ability of Jnana to manifest and be felt/experienced without the aid of words. Mouna is the natural language of the Jnani [sage] through which the Jnana experience is “transmitted”. To the finest, most mature disciples, Sri Ramana conveys the essence of his teachings through Silence [mouna-upadesa].

However, it is worth recalling here the teaching of Bhagavan, who, when asked by one of the pilgrims to “give” him Moksha, responded with laughter and said [Letters from Sri Ramanasramam]: "If you renounce and give up everything, what remains is only moksha. What is there for others to give you? It is there always. That is. [...] If you give up all the desires that you have, what remains is only moksha. And you require sadhana to get rid of all those desires".
Thus, the word “transmitted” used here for lack of a better alternative should not be understood literally, but rather as Jnani's power to destroy the identifications and hidden tendencies of the mind of a disciple who has satsanga with him, because Moksha or Brahman shines spontaneously after the complete destruction of the above-mentioned, and it is not something that can be “given” or “transmitted” in the colloquial sense.

In Nan Yar? Sri Ramana defined Silence [Mouna] as follows: “The place (or state) where even the slightest trace of the thought ‘I’ does not exist, alone is Self (swarupam). That alone is called ‘Silence’ (maunam)”.

Mouna is therefore a state of divine Silence, which is complete surrender to the Supreme and living without a sense of a separate “I”, which manifests spontaneously after the ego disappears and one immerses oneself in the Self.

Heart - the Tamil word “ullam” is translated into English as “heart”.

However, this word does not refer to a physical organ, a psychological center of human emotions, an energy center such as the heart chakra, a nerve plexus, or anything similar.

On the path of Sri Ramana Maharishi, the Heart is another name for Absolute Reality, Pure Consciousness, the Self, which alone exists.

The Tamil word “ul” means “to exist, to be”, and “that which exists” is the first and fundamental meaning of the word “Ullam”. The “heart” is neither inside nor outside, but as long as a person identifies with the body-mind, it is recommended that they should turn inward and look for the place from which the I-thought rises. As a result of this search, the I-thought disappears, and what remains is the Heart, the Self, Reality.

The Sanskrit equivalent of the word “heart” used by Sri Ramana is “hridayam” [hrdayam]: “hrit” means “heart” and ‘ayam’ means “I am”. The name itself indicates what this concept is about: what we really are — the very core of our being.

On our website, the word “Heart” written in capital letters is synonymous with the Self, while the word written in lowercase letters usually has a different meaning (exceptions may be situations where the author of the translated text wrote “heart” in lowercase letters in the original, even though the word refers to the Self in a given context).

Direct path - Bhagavan Sri Ramana teaches that Atma-vichara is the direct path, the only reliable, direct method of realizing the unconditioned Absolute Being that we really are. But this does not mean that he urges us to attack the mind and confront it directly, for this is not what the directness of Atma-vichara is about. Its directness consists in directing our attention directly to the Self, “I am”, in order to abide in the Self while ignoring the mind. It can therefore be said that Atma-vichara is hiding from the mind and avoiding it, rather than confronting it face to face.

Any other spiritual path that does not have such direct clinging to the Self as its central theme is not a direct path – it will not destroy the mind [ego], it requires the mind to be preserved as an instrument for performing sadhana, and it cannot be practiced without it. The ego may take on various, increasingly subtle forms at successive stages of such a path, but it will never be destroyed.

Nowadays, there are indirect spiritual paths called - probably in order to attract more people - direct, although in fact they are not direct. Attempts to defeat the mind in direct combat with it are doomed to failure and in Eastern philosophy are compared to trying to defeat the demon Vali. Demon Vali had a certain gift – he took half the power of those who confronted him face to face, which is why he automatically became more powerful than anyone who fought him. Therefore, Rama, unable to defeat him in this way, hid behind a tree and shot him from behind.
Just as Vali took half of his opponents' power, so too, when we try to fight the mind [ego] in direct combat, we give it half of our strength, because our attention is what nourishes and sustains it; therefore, the more attention we give it, the more strength we give it.

Some call “direct” those spiritual methods that call for direct combat with the mind and attempts to control it by force, but forceful methods of controlling the mind can at best lead to a state of mano-laya, which is not the destruction of the mind [mano-nasa] and is not of great value.

The mano-laya state can take two forms: deep sleep or kevala-nirvikalpa-samadhi. When a person comes out from either state of laya, the vasanas begin to function as before; thus, no progress is made in the state of laya, no matter how long one remains in it. Therefore, it is not enough to be content with the state of laya, even if it is kevala-nirvikalpa-samadhi.

Kevala-nirvikalpa-samadhi is the result of the mind being prevented from grasping external sensory objects. However, although the human mind is calm and free from distraction in this state, it cannot go any further. Sri Ramana recommends that in order to go further, one should direct the calm and undistracted mind, which has come out of the state of laya, towards the Self, Self-attentiveness, because only through Self-attentiveness [Atma-vichara] can one attain the state of mano-nasa [destruction of the mind], which is a sine qua non condition for Liberation.

Bhagavan said [Upadesa Undiyar]:
„ […] When one makes the mind, which has subsided by restraining the breath, go on the one path of knowing Self, its form will die”.

thus pointing the way through direct practice from the state of mano-laya to the state of mano-nasa, Self-realization.

Consciousness [Chit] – is Pure Consciousness of Sat-Chit-Ananda. It lies beyond the grasp of the word-using mind, and no words can describe it, so we will not attempt to do so here. However, due to the fact that the term “consciousness” is used to describe at least two different states, we would like to draw attention here to the common mistake of confusing Pure Consciousness [Chit] with limited relative consciousness [chittam].

The Pure Consciousness [Chit] praised in the sacred scriptures is not the same as the discriminating, relative consciousness of the mind called chittam, which we use every day to distinguish objects or experiences and value them. This limited consciousness of the mind, where hidden tendencies [vasanas] are stored, is said to be merely a reflection of Pure Consciousness and is sometimes referred to as “reflected consciousness” [chit abhasa] or “mixed consciousness”. However, since there are not really two consciousnesses, this reflected consciousness does not have the light of consciousness on its own, so it uses the light of Pure Consciousness - but it is not this reflected consciousness that is praised in the sastras and it is not what is meant in the spiritual paths of the East.

Just as the moon does not have its own light but shines with the reflected light of the sun, so too the mind does not have its own light of consciousness but uses the reflected light of Pure Consciousness. Just as flowers will not bloom and the earth will not yield crops by the moonlight, so by the reflected light of consciousness, man will not experience his true nature of Being-Consciousness-Bliss, but will wander endlessly, deluded by the illusion of Maya, taking appearance for reality and reality for non-existence.

Nowadays, many people try to glorify and praise this reflected consciousness [cittam] as the ultimate goal of spirituality, encouraging others to do the same.

In one of his conversations, Sri Ramana used the following allegory to describe the relationship between Pure Consciousness and reflected consciousness [Maharshi's Gospel Volume II]:

„Just as water in the pot reflects the enormous sun within the narrow limits of the pot, even so the vasanas or latent tendencies of the mind of the individual, acting as the reflecting medium, catch the all-pervading, infinite light of Consciousness arising from the heart and present in the form of a reflection the phenomenon called the mind. Seeing only this reflection, the ajnani is deluded into the belief that he is a finite being, the jiva. If the mind becomes introverted through enquiry into the source of aham-vritti, the vasanas become extinct, and in the absence of the reflecting medium the phenomenon of reflection, namely, the mind, also disappears being absorbed into the light of the one Reality, the heart”.

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[Maharshi's Gospel Volume II]: „The moon shines by reflecting the light of the sun. When the sun has set, the moon is useful for displaying objects. When the sun has risen no one needs the moon, though its disc is visible in the sky. So it is with the mind and the heart. The mind is made useful by its reflected light. It is used for seeing objects. When turned inwards, it merges into the source of illumination which shines by Itself and the mind is then like the moon in the daytime. When it is dark, a lamp is necessary to give light. But when the sun has arisen, there is no need for the lamp; the objects are visible. And to see the sun no lamp is necessary; it is enough if you turn your eyes towards the self-luminous sun. Similarly with the mind; to see the objects the light reflected from the mind is necessary. To see the heart it is enough that the mind is turned towards it. Then the mind does not count and the heart is self-effulgent”.

The term “Consciousness” [Chit] in Ramana Maharshi's teachings is not the antonym of unconsciousness, as some people tend to assume, but refers to the core of our existence, the self-effulgent Self, the foundation on which the world and all mental states manifest themselves. The ambiguity of the word “consciousness” gives rise to many misunderstandings, chief among them the assumption that intellectual knowledge of certain truths is the “consciousness” extolled in the scriptures, which is completely erroneous.

Objectified consciousness - consciousness which divides itself into perceived external objects and the internal perceiver. In Tamil, it is referred to as “suttarivu” - since there is no equivalent in English or Polish that would fully convey the meaning of the original, several different terms are used to describe this consciousness. It is also called false consciousness or reflected consciousness.

Sri Ramana says the following about this consciousness [Padamalai]: „Though the Atma-swarupa is one’s own true nature, the reason why it appears difficult to attain is because of the powerful illusion wrought through suttarivu”.

Tapas - in dictionaries, tapas is defined as asceticism; literally, the word “tapas” means burning with fire or undergoing bodily mortification. According to the Bhagavad Gita, asceticism can be of three kinds: asceticism of the body [sarira-tapas], asceticism of speech [van-maya-tapas], and asceticism of the mind [manasa-tapas]. The Bhagavad Gita calls these three types of tapas in their pure form sattvic; if asceticism is tainted by ostentation or the desire to gain fame or honors, it becomes rajasic; when it turns into self-torture or aims to harm another being, it becomes tamasic.

However, Bhagavan Ramana gives a new definition of this word in verse 30 of Upadesa Undiyar. This verse says that Atma-nishta [i.e., abiding in the Self, which is an ocean of Bliss] is true, excellent tapas.

Some people, in the name of practicing tapas, perform harsh practices on their bodies (e.g., panchatapagni which means sitting in meditation surrounded by fire on five sides). Such practices can be called tapas only in the literal sense of the word and are performed only to fulfill desires in this or the next world. These desires may be selfish (satisfying one's own needs) or unselfish (satisfying the needs of the world), but they can only take place as long as the ego lasts.

However, the goal of true tapas is Happiness/Bliss [Ananda], which can only be achieved when the ego is destroyed. We should therefore only perform true tapas, which consists in destroying the ego.

The only path to destroying the ego is Self-attention (also called Self-enquiry or Atma-vichara). Is Self-attention self-torture or burning oneself with fire? According to the words “I am the path and the goal”, the path is always of the same nature as the goal, and since each of us knows from the experience of deep sleep that the state of ego absence is full of bliss, it is clear that clinging to the Self [Self-attention], which is the closest and dearest thing to all of us, is also an experience of happiness or bliss, extremely far from the experience of torture, suffering, torment, or misery.

So if Self-attention is associated with such love and joy, why is it called tapas? Sri Ramana says that thinking of tapas as an experience of suffering is a mistake resulting from ignorance and delusion, and simultaneously introduces his revolutionary concept of tapas.

Happiness is our true nature, but due to a lack of Self-attentiveness born of ignorance, we abandon it, leave it behind, and suffer. Therefore, it is our natural and joyful duty to restore Self-attention in order to abide in our true nature — and this is true tapas.

Liberation [Mukti, Moksha] – breaking the bonds of conditioned existence; the highest human possibility and value; a permanent and irreversible breaking of the body-consciousness knot [chit-jada-granthi] and, along with it, breaking the identification with the body/mind and the bonds of karma.

Characteristic features:

- permanent, final/ultimate, irrevocable, the highest possible state, not subject to gradation or differentiation;
- permanent and irreversible destruction of all sanskaras and vasanas;
- the unchanging and ungradable state of supreme bliss of pure consciousness of existence [sat-chit-ananda];
- transcending the three commonly known states (waking, dream, deep sleep) and the conditioning of this and other worlds;
- irreversible destruction of the mind [mano-nasa];
- the final and irreversible destruction of the ego; a permanently destroyed I-thought [ego] can never be reborn;
- a single state of consciousness instead of the changing states of waking, dreaming, and deep sleep;
- the state of non-dual oneness, the absence of experiencing or perceiving differences;
- the absence of the triad seer-seeing-seen;
- the state of definitive cessation of all suffering;
- the state of realization of the Self, Absolute Reality.


This is an extremely rare state, referred to as “paratpara” – the highest of the highest. It should not be confused with the popular understanding of awakening, enlightenment, or liberation from something the ego-person.

The word “enlightenment” most likely came to Advaita from Buddhism – to the best of our knowledge, this word is not used in the writings of classical Advaita and was certainly not used by Ramana Maharshi. Most often, when Bhagavan spoke of pure consciousness or true knowledge, he used the Tamil word “arivu”, which is equivalent to the Sanskrit word “jnana”. He also often used the Sanskrit term “atma-jnana” to refer to the realization of the Self, and another Sanskrit word “mukti”, or the Tamil word “mutti” to refer to Liberation.

Buddhists use the word “enlightenment” to describe several states, referring either to the state of Nirvana as the ultimate highest state or to some intermediate states of “enlightenment”. A similar, though seemingly much more liberal, approach to the word “enlightenment” has been adopted in Neo-Advaita, the New Age movement, and the non-duality movement, where it is commonly used to describe various states, mostly more or less distant from the state of Liberation [Mukti, Moksha], and in the absence of clear, consistent, and binding criteria for “enlightenment” understood in this way, there is essentially complete freedom and subjectivity in determining who can be called “enlightened” and on what grounds.

Many people call themselves “enlightened” in the belief that the state they have achieved is the highest state because they believe they are more advanced than they actually are; others postulate different levels of “enlightenment”, placing themselves somewhere lower or higher on the scale of the pantheon of “enlightened” beings; still others consider Liberation [Mukti, Moksha] to be a non-existent, mythical, or unattainable state, thus denying its existence and considering what they have achieved to be the highest “enlightenment”; there are also those who, running a spiritual business, describe themselves as “enlightened” for marketing purposes.

We should also not forget the colloquial use of the word enlightenment to refer to a sudden understanding of an issue and to describe a cultural movement and period in human history otherwise known as the Age of Reason or the Age of Enlightenment. What is more, the term is now freely used by personal trainers and proponents of so-called “scientific views” to describe their state of knowledge, thus losing its spiritual connotation and becoming a commonplace term.

If we assume that the highest, ultimate state of non-dual oneness, which cannot be graded or differentiated, is described by the word Nirvana (Ramana Maharshi in Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, when asked about this word, defined Nirvana as, among other things, “the loss of individuality”, "a state of perfection in which there are neither objects nor subjects, nothing to see, nothing to feel, nothing to know“, ”a state of blissful ure consciousness ‘I am’“), and we consider the word ”enlightenment“ to be its exclusive synonym, then we could use the term “enlightenment” as a synonym for the word ”Liberation" [Mukti, Moksha]. However, since the word “enlightenment” is also given various other meanings, describing other inferior, gradual spiritual states, at this point the term loses its ability to be equivalent to the word "Liberation" [Mukti, Moksha] or “Self-realization”.
(By the way, it should be noted that the word “Liberation” also has its popular meanings, which is why when using it, we usually add the terms “Mukti, Moksha” in parentheses to clearly indicate what we are talking about.)

The same applies to the term “awakening” – there is basically a free-for-all when it comes to its use, and anyone who has taken any step on the spiritual path (or even if they haven't) can successfully call themselves awakened.

Liberation [Mukti, Moksha] as referred to in the context of Ramana Maharshi's teachings should not be confused with the various forms of “liberation” widely offered today, such as “liberation from the Matrix”, “liberation from the System”, “liberation from the Dark Forces ruling the world”, etc., because all these “liberations” aim to liberate the ego-person from something, whereas in Ramana Maharshi's teachings, liberation is from the ego-person to life in the real Self.
Such Liberation [Mukti, Moksha] also frees us from the need for any other “liberations”, because by liberating ourselves from the ego-person, we can no longer be subject to its conditioning, so we have all “liberations” sorted out in one fell swoop.

Facing chaos and widespread misunderstanding of terms, one of the contemporary spiritual schools proposed the following gradation of these three spiritual milestones: awakening, enlightenment, and liberation, which seems quite reasonable and accurately reflects the state of affairs.

And so, in order from lowest to highest:

1.Awakening: waking up from the sleepwalk of mundane existence and recognizing that there is a deeper truth and a deeper dimension of existence.

Characteristics:

- still a relatively poor distinguishing of spiritual truths and the direction in which one should follow in order to realize them;
- still active ego, identification with the body/mind, the body-consciousness knot, and the bonds of karma;
- non-final, non-permanent, reversible, gradable state;
- can have various depths and levels;
- duality, perception of differences, and subjection to the changing states of waking, dreaming, and deep sleep;
- possible fall from this state back to the starting point;
- possible to “achieve” a higher state than this.

2. Enlightenment: insight into spiritual truths and deeper dimensions of existence; seeing/understanding and distinguishing them.

Characteristics:

- still active ego, identification with the body/mind, the body-consciousness knot, and the bonds of karma;
- non-final, non-permanent, reversible, gradable state;
- can have various depths and levels;
- duality, perception of differences, and subjection to the changing states of waking, dreaming, and deep sleep;
- possible fall from this state; however, from a certain point on, impossible (or at least very difficult) to turn back and return to a completely mundane life;
- possible to “achieve” a higher state than this.


3. Liberation: breaking the bonds of conditional existence, the body-consciousness knot, identification with the body/mind, the bonds of karma, and realizing truths that one previously only had a vague sense of or insight into or understanding of.

Characteristics:

- the highest, final, permanent, irreversible, non-gradable state;
- nundifferentiated oneness, with no different depths or levels;
- transcendence of waking, dreaming, and deep sleep, as well as the limitations of this and other worlds;
- non-duality, no perception or experience of differences;
- impossible fall and loss of this state;
- impossible to “achieve” a higher state than this.

However, we would like to point out, first of all, that this gradation was not conveyed by Ramana Maharshi, and secondly, that it is not the only correct and possible attempt to portray and describe these three states. Nevertheless, we present it here because it shows the superiority of Liberation over the other states and allows to point out the essential features that distinguish Liberation from these states.

On our website, in addition to the word “Liberation” [Mukti, Moksha], we also use other terms to describe the highest state, including: Self-realization, Jnana, Sat-Chit-Ananda, Pure Consciousness, non-dual state, Reality, natural state