ESSENTIAL TO UNDERSTAND

Feel the blood surging in your veins, the air moving in and out of your lungs, and your hands resting on your thighs.  These are not an “other” but you yourself.
 
The background consciousness witnessing your life is the Atman.  The Atman is not an “other” but you yourself, who you really are. The Atman is Brahman.

OBSERVATIONS BY KOLLER

In his 1970 book Oriental Philosophies (Scribner’s), John M. Koller makes observations that are meaningful to this day.  He says that “the Self (Atman) can be known in the surest way possible, for it is self-revealing in consciousness when the objects of consciousness that block out self-illumination are transcended.”--p30

He then points out that “because of the deep-seated ignorance that results from the objectification of the world, and because of the resulting multiplicity, one is inclined to think of the ultimate reality as an other.  But this is a mistake, for ‘in the beginning all this world was Brahman only.  Whoever thus knows, “I am Brahman” (Aham Brahman asi) becomes this All.’”--p31

He adds that “this Self (Atman) is the ultimate subject which can never become an object.  Consequently, it can never be known in the way that objects in consciousness can be known, but must be realized directly in self-illuminating experiences.”--p32

He says at the end that “those without faith or experience might be skeptical of the existence of the Atman and the possibility of Atman-realization.  But those who have experienced the bliss of the Atman know no other joy--they are completely fulfilled.”--Ibid.

WHAT THE ATMAN SEES

What happens when the Atman no longer identifies with the egoic self?  It notices as never before what the egoic self is doing.

It watches, to begin with, the multitude of irrelevant things the egoic self is involved with, irrelevant in that the things have everything to do with the relative world and nothing to do with the spiritual world, with liberation.

It observes the egoic self’s attraction to other egoic selves.  It is aware of the attraction and of its effect.  Since, however, the Atman no longer identifies with the egoic self, it experiences the attraction once removed.

The act of thinking the Atman no longer experiences directly as well.  It sees that thinking occurs only in the mind, and it, the Atman, is not the mind.  The Atman cannot be the mind because the mind is transient, whereas the Atman is eternal.

As background consciousness, the Atman is not aware of itself.  It merely observes what is happening before it.  Above all, it does not judge.

REVEALED KNOWLEDGE

The Vedas are the revealed scriptures of the Indo-Aryans.  Vedas have two portions, the work portion and the knowledge portion.  The Upanishads is the knowledge portion.

The exact date of the Upanishads is unknown, possibly from 3000 BC to 800 BC.  The authorship is not certain; the authors who are named in it claim that they themselves were not the author, that the information was revealed to them.

The word “Upanishads” means to sit devotedly near.  A second meaning is secret knowledge.  A final meaning, provided by the philosopher-saint Shankara, is knowledge of Brahman leading to moksha, liberation. 
 
The three meanings can be combined as the supreme wisdom of Brahman that can be delivered by an illumined teacher as secret knowledge.

A MEDITATION

Seeing yourself once again for the last time.

MAHAVAKYAS

Mahavakyas are great truths stating the oneness of the individual soul, the Atman, with Brahman.  There is a mahavakya in each of the four Vedas:

(1) In the Aitareya Upanishad of the Rig-Veda there is “Consciousness is Brahman” (“Prajnanam Brahma”).

(2) In the Brihadaaranyaka Upanishad of the Yajur Veda there is “I am Brahman” (“Aham Brahmasmi”).

(3) In the Chandogya Upanishad of the Sama Veda there is “That thou art” (“Tat tvam asi”).

(4) In the Mandukya Upanishad of the Atharva Veda there is “This Self is Brahman” (“Ayam Atma Brahma”). 
   
These four mahavakyas are to be understood, meditated upon, and realized.

CORE PHILOSOPHY

Christopher Isherwood was a novelist and initiate of the Vedanta Society of Southern California, headed by Swami Prabhavananda.  In his introduction to the collection of essays Vedanta for Modern Man, Isherwood points out that Vedanta is a nondualistic philosophy that teaches that Brahman (the Ultimate Reality behind the phenomenal universe) is “one without a second.”
 
Brahman, he says, is beyond attributes.  Brahman is not conscious; Brahman is consciousness.  Brahman does not exist; Brahman is existence.  Brahman is the Atman (the Eternal Nature) of every human being, creature and object.
 
Vedanta teaches that Life has no other purpose than the following:  that we shall learn to know ourselves for what we really are, that we shall reject the superficial ego-personality that claims that “I am Mr. Smith; I am other than Mr. Brown,” and know, instead, that “I am the Atman; Mr. Brown is the Atman; the Atman is Brahman; there is nothing anywhere but Brahman; all else is appearance, transience, and unreality.”

OVER THERE

The Kauai Hindu Monastery website has an introduction to Hinduism which includes this statement:  Hinduism strongly declares the validity of the three worlds of existence--physical, astral, and spiritual. 

“Astral” is a word you do not hear very often.  In his book Autobiography of a Yogi, Paramhansa Yogananda describes the astral planes as he learned of them from his resurrected guru Sri Yukteswar Giri.

Yogananada explains that following death nearly all individuals enter the astral planes.  It is there that they work out their past karma by way of astral incarnations.  If necessary they return to earthly incarnations for further refinement.

On attaining the meditative state of nirvikalpa samadhi, the soul then progresses upward to what is called the illumined astral planet of Hiranyaloka.  This is a transitional stage following which the soul moves upward to the more subtle causal spheres.
 
It is in these subtle causal spheres that additional incarnations will allow the soul to become further refined before its final unification with God.

ON AND OFF

Philosopher Alan Watts likened this world of form to a game of “now you see it, now you don’t.”   The reason it is “now you see it, now you don’t” is because of the mutual arising of opposites.  When something comes into existence, it carries with it the capacity to not be in existence.  Everything has a built-in on-and-off switch, this way. The trouble is, we cannot know in advance when a thing that is on, including ourselves, is going to be off.  Similarly, we cannot know ahead of time how long a thing that is off, including ourselves, will remain off.

BEEN THERE, DONE THAT

Some things, like death, we have never tried before.  We have to wait until we get to it to find out how it works.  Then again, those who hold to reincarnation argue that we have died many times in the past, that it is nothing new.  Indeed, they say, there is nothing in this world that we have not had a go at, at least once before.  We are veterans of this place.

REMEMBERING

It is not good to remember someone after they are gone.  It holds them back.

UNDERAPPRECIATED

We do not appreciate the importance of space, philosopher Alan Watts said.  We think of space as absence, as nothing, when in fact it is the medium in which all things exist. 
 
If there was no space, there would be nowhere for things to be.  Indeed, were there no space there would be no things.  Space and things arise mutually.  They are two sides of the same coin.

Space is not nothing.

APPROXIMATIONS

We live as approximations of ourselves.  Who we are at this moment is not who we were in the previous moment or who we will be in the next moment.

THE RELATIONSHIP

God knows you because He is you.

GROWING UP, GROWING DOWN

Growing up is construction and complication, while growing down is deconstruction and simplification.  Corresponding to this are what Vedanta calls the four stages of life, the ashramas. 
 
The brahmachari :  In  the  student  life  the emphasis is on commitment to learning.  Some professional skills are to be learned, along with training in Vedanta under a guru.  The principle goal of the student is to become a person of refinement.
 
The grihasta:  The householder life is where one learns such virtues as tolerance, accommodation, and adjustment for the sake of others.  It is a life of service and sacrifice.  The qualities of forgiveness and trust are also developed while one is a householder.

The vanaprastha:  This is a training period for gradual withdrawal.  Here the individual learns to remove himself from family matters, passing on his responsibilities to the next generation.  This frees him for spiritual pursuits and studies.  He learns, in this phase, to love solitude and activities that are introverted.  Self-knowledge is the focus here, in preparation for sanyasa.

Sanyasa:  In this stage, the individual gives up everything, especially ignorance, i.e. wrong thinking, and the egoic self.  He becomes “purified” in this way and places his life in God’s hands.  Whether or not he physically renounces all things is not important.  Rather it is his state of mind that matters.  Shaving off his hair or wearing ochre robes is not the point, so much as his abandoning all attachments.  Even while living with his family he can mentally be a sanyasi.

This is the growing up, growing down trajectory then, the construction, complication, deconstruction, and simplification that an individual’s life is to take according to Vedanta.  It is viewed as a spiritual journey.