Among the visitors, one morning, was a professor of philosophy from the northern India. He
had met Maharaj several times. This morning he was accompanied by a friend of his, an artist of
some merit, but apparently not particularly interested in what Maharaj speaks about.
The professor started the discussion. He said he was so struck by what Maharaj had told him
during his last visit, that every time he thought about it he felt a surge of vibrations through his
body. Maharaj had told him that the only way to go back was the way by which he had arrived, and
there was no other way. This sentence, said the professor, struck a deep chord within him leaving no
room for doubt or query. But subsequently, when he began to think more deeply about the matter,
especially the 'how' of it, he had found himself hopelessly entangled in an unholy mess of ideas and
concepts. He said he felt like a man who had received the gift of a precious diamond but had later
lost it. What was he to do now?
Maharaj began speaking softly. He said: Please, understand. No truth remains as truth the
moment it is given expression. It becomes a concept! Add to it the fact that in order to communicate
with each other, the words 'I' and 'you', and 'we' and 'they' have necessarily to be used. Thus, the
very first thought breaks the unicity and creates duality; indeed it is only in duality that
communication can take place. Words themselves further expand the dichotomy. But that is not all.
Then the listener, instead of directly and intuitively perceiving what is being communicated, begins
the process of relative reasoning with its implicit limitations when applied to the subjective and the
noumenal.
Are you with me so far, Maharaj enquired, and then continued. What is relative reasoning? It is
the process of reasoning whereby a subject creates in his consciousness objects with opposing
qualities or characteristics which could be compared. In other words, the process just cannot work
except on the basis of a subject-object duality. Such relative reasoning may be effective, and indeed
necessary, for describing objects by comparison. But how can it work with the subjective? That
which conceives — the subject — obviously cannot conceive itself as an object! The eye can see
everything else except itself!
Is it any wonder therefore, said Maharaj, that you have found yourself bogged down in the
mire of ideas and concepts from which you find it impossible to extricate yourself? If you could
only see the actual position, you would see what a joke it is!
This is the background. Now, to the real problem: Who is this 'you' that is trying to go back the
way he came? No matter how far back you go chasing your shadow, the shadow will always
precede you. What is meant by going back? It means going back to the position when there was
total absence of consciousness. But — and this is the crux of the matter— so long as there is a
negator who keeps on negating and negating (chasing the shadow), 'you' will remain un-negated.
Try to apperceive what I am saying, not with your intellect, not as 'you' using your intellect, but just
apperceiving as such.
I wonder if I have made myself clear, asked Maharaj.
Just then I happened to look at the artist friend of the professor and was struck by the intensity
of his concentration. Instead of being bored, or only mildly interested, he was listening to every
word of Maharaj as if hypnotized. Maharaj also must have noticed this because he smiled at him
and the artist, without uttering a word, folded his hands in salutation and nodded his head several
times in a gesture of silent communion.
The professor, however, seemed to have come to a mental obstruction, an impenetrable block,
and he said so. Maharaj then told him that this 'block' was an imaginary obstruction caused by an
imaginary 'you', which had identified itself with the body. He said: I repeat, there must be a final
and total negation so that the negator himself disappears! What you are trying to do is to understand
what you are by means of a concept of 'existence', whereas in reality 'I' (you) neither am, nor am
not, 'I' am beyond the very concept of existence, beyond the concept of both the positive and the
negative presence. Unless this is understood very profoundly you will continue to create your own
imaginary obstructions, each more powerful than the earlier one. What you are trying to find is
what you already are.
The professor then asked: Does it mean then that no one can lead me back to what I am?
Maharaj confirmed that that was indeed so. You are — you always have been — where you want to
be led. Actually, there really is no 'where' that you can be led to. Awareness of this obvious position
is the answer—just the apperception; nothing to be done. And the tragic irony is that such
awareness and apperception can not be an act of volition. Does your waking state come about by
itself, or do you awaken yourself as an act of volition? Indeed, the least effort on 'your' part will
prevent what otherwise might have happened naturally and spontaneously. And the joke within the
joke is that your deliberately not doing anything will also prevent it happening! It is simple really;
'doing' something and 'not doing' something are both volitional efforts. There must be a total
absence of the 'do-er, the total absence of both the positive and the negative aspects of 'doing'.
Indeed, this is true 'surrender'.
When, at the end of the session, the professor and his artist friend were leaving, Maharaj
smiled at the artist and asked him whether he would be coming again. The artist paid his respects
most humbly, smiled and said that he could not possibly avoid it, and I wondered who had had the
real benefit of the talk that morning, the actively articulate professor with his learned intellectuality,
or the passively receptive artist with his sensitive insight. ••
POINTERS FROM NISARGADATTA MAHARAJ
By Ramesh S. Balsekar
