The Self that is Awareness

Though the world and mind rise and fade together, the world shines by the light of the mind. The ground whence the world and mind arise, and wherein they set, that Perfection rises not nor sets but ever shines. That is Reality.

Under whatever name or form we worship It, It leads us on to knowledge of the nameless, formless Absolute. Yet, to see one's true Self in the Absolute, to subside into It and be one with It, this is the true Knowledge of the Truth.

`Twos' and `threes' depend upon one thing, the ego. If one asks in one's Heart, `What is this ego?' and finds it, they slip away. Only those who have found this know the Truth, and they will never be perplexed.

There is no knowledge without ignorance; and without knowledge ignorance cannot be. To ask, `Whose is this knowledge? Whose this ignorance?' and thus to know the primal Self, this alone is Knowledge.

Without knowing the Self that knows, to know all objects is not knowledge; it is only ignorance. Self, the ground of knowledge and the non-Self, being known, both knowledge and ignorance fall away.

True Knowledge is being devoid of knowledge as well as ignorance of objects. Knowledge of objects is not true knowledge. Since the Self shines self-luminous, with nothing else for It to know, with nothing else to know It, the Self is Knowledge. Nescience It is not.

The Self that is Awareness, that alone is true. The knowledge which is various is ignorance. And even ignorance, which is false, cannot exist apart from the Self. False are the many jewels, for apart from gold, which alone is true, they cannot exist.

`You' and `he' -- these appear only when `I' does. But when the nature of the `I' is sought and the ego is destroyed, `you' and `he' are at an end. What shines then as the One alone is the true Self.

Past and future are dependent on the present. The past was present in its time and the future will be present too. Ever-present is the present. To seek to know the future and the past, without knowing the truth of time today, is to try to count without the number `One'.

Without us there is no time nor space. If we are only bodies, we are caught up in time and space. But are we bodies? Now, then and always -- here, now and everywhere -- we are the same. We exist, timeless and spaceless we.

~ from Reality on Forty Verses by Sri Ramana Maharshi