The Direct Path

The Direct Path

According the great Indian sage of Arununchala, Ramana Maharshi the only way SELF realization can be achieved is by the complete quietening of the mind.

... Ramana Maharshi


The mind, which causes all thoughts to arise, keeps us believing the world and ourselves are real, when in reality every single object appearing in the universe is an ephemeral, transient, cluster of vibrating energy animated by the ONE consciousness and has no fixed independent life of its own.

It is our attachment to this ephemeral dream state and the desire to keep it changeless and permanent that causes all our suffering. This illusory reality we cling so tightly to has no solidity, and is perpetually rearranging itself through the process of birth and death of all objects, giving meaning to the play of consciousness known as Lila.

Questions asked of him in the book “The Spiritual Teachings of Ramana Maharshi” reveal through the continual practice of SELF- INQUIRY we can take the “Direct path to Realization”

Question: How will the mind become Quiescent?



Ramana: By the inquiry “Who am I?” the thought “Who am I?” will destroy all other thoughts, and, like, the stick used for stirring the burning pyre, it will in the end get destroyed. Then there will arise Self-Realization.

Question: What is the means for constantly holding onto the thought ‘Who am I”

Ramana: “When other thoughts arise, one should not pursue them, but should enquire “TO WHOM DID THEY ARISE”?
It does not matter how many thoughts arise. As each thought arises, one should inquire with diligence, “TO WHOM HAS THIS THOUGHT ARISEN”?
The answer that would emerge would be “TO ME”

Thereupon, if one inquires, “WHO AM I”, the mind will become quiescent. With repeated practice in this manner, the mind will develop the skill to stay in its source.

When we ask “Who am I”?, the “I” he is referring to is the “I” we believe ourselves to be , the little ‘I’, the ME, the ego, a unique individual entity with our own separate soul, and separate from all the rest.

Through the practice of continually questioning “WHO AM I”, in this manner it is eventually recognised that this ‘I’ or ‘Me’ we thought ourselves to be cannot be located within, and no matter how hard we search no fixed ME or I can be found..

With no ME to be found, a great spaciousness or emptiness is experienced in which all objects including our own bodies appear and disappear in. Those objects also include mountains, rivers, animals, plants, trees, birds , rocks, fish, oceans, stars , planets, atoms, molecules, all life as we know it.



As the object known as a human being, we have since birth been programmed much like a computer.

Beliefs are formed in us through familial, religious, educational, and cultural conditioning creating memories and concepts that form our own personal computer chip. And it is through this ‘unique’ chip the ONE Consciousness expresses itself as billions of vastly different human beings. (Only through contrast is Lila possible, try to imagine a play in which every person played the same role and had the same physical appearance and character traits, how boring would that be, and who would show up to see it anyway?!)

In all other objects consciousness equally expresses itself through that objects particular evolutionary program.

To accept this concept is true liberation from birth and death, right and wrong, good and evil, pride and blame, attachment and desire, and believing we are a unique fixed entity with a soul that lives on and on reincarnating from one hellish life to the next.

Instead we see through our dream state and accept we are all a part of consciousness at play, Lila expressing itself.



Real peace can only happen to the mind that is free of all thought and freedom from thought can only come about by enquiring into and letting go of the false identity we have thought ourselves to be.

That a quiet mind ensures equanimity is known and accepted by most. The mystery of why and how life is played is way beyond our ability to comprehend and in the end the mystery just has to be accepted for being just that ,a mystery.

And the only way we can really enjoy life as part of this mystery is to inquire deeply into whom we really are which can only, with perseverance, reveal all we are truly not.