Nisargadatta’s Ultimate Sutra

His Complete Teaching in 442 Words:

You see, this "I-am-ness" is normally this five-elemental interaction and play. Out of the earth, with the help of water, sprouting of vegetation takes place. Out of vegetation, the essences are drawn and out of the essences, which are the food for all beings, come the grains for human beings. Now from the quintessence of this food, the "I-am-ness" is sustained. The food is stored in the form of a body. The food is continuously consumed by the vital breath. And in the process of consuming this food, the vital breath sustains that flame of "I-am-ness." To have "I-am-ness," the food body and vital breath are very necessary; in short, one may say it is a product of food body essence and vital breath. Then only this "I-am-ness" or consciousness is available.

Now the consciousness, when it gets involved with the body-mind, is the individual. It is conditioned by body and mind. Mind is concepts. Whatever it receives through the five senses, and is stored, that is the mind. And whatever the words that flow out, that is also mind. So when that consciousness is conditioned by the body and the mind, it is individualistic, a personality. And I always tell people, you depersonify yourself by not identifying with the body-mind. When you do that, you are that manifest principle; you are no more a personality, you are only consciousness.

When you are in that consciousness state, you are in a position to observe the mind flow, any thoughts occurring to you-you are apart from thought. You don't identify with that thought. Since you observe the body and its actions, you are not one with those; you are apart from that body. Thus, you are now in consciousness; that is the first stage. So when you are only consciousness, you are all manifest; this is to be realized. Then, provided you are, everything is, your world is, and your god is. You are the primary cause, the prerequisite for anything else to exist, whether it be your god or your world. You abide only in consciousness. In your attention, only consciousness should be there. That is the meditation.

Now the next step is-the question raised in the morning-are you in a position to observe consciousness? This is also the final step. When you are in a position to observe or witness consciousness-and, of course, the vital breath, body and its actions-then by virtue of that very observation, you are apart from the consciousness.

So when you are in a position to observe consciousness, you are out of consciousness. Then you are what we call "the awareness state," the vijnana or jnana state.

(from ‘The Ultimate Medicine’)

the greatest foe & the greatest friend

Nisargadatta Maharaj: You understand yourself as body-mind; therefore my problem is - how to make you understand. Lord Krishna said, "All are my expressions." The mountain is of gold and a particle of that mountain is also gold. I am that mountain and every particle is myself. The entire beingness manifest is myself, and each being is a sample of myself. The knowledge "I Am" in each species is myself. The very life force - luminous, bright, radiant, indwelling principle is myself.

If anybody understands me totally and fully and most appropriately, that one gets the shelter in the shade of my benign being.

The state of a jnani, the highest state, has transcended the beingness, but the beingness is still there, so together with the beingness is the Absolute - the deep blue, benign state, without eyes.

Knowledge takes rest in that deep blue, quiet, peaceful, benign shade. When that shade is shifted aside, then he sees the various manifestations in the form of universes and worlds. But when the shade is there, it is the deep, dark blue state, fully relaxed.


Questioner: Is Maharaj going to stop talking?


M. The talks will emanate provided someone worthy is there to put questions. I am nearing the end of my time. If any questions sprout, ask them.


Q: I want to stay here with Maharaj as long as possible.


M. Although you might go home, whatever has been planted, whatever you have received, is going to change you. You are completely possessed.


Q. I feel that. I am grateful that at the tag-end of my life I was brought here.


M. Your coming here was also spontaneous. It is very rare that someone has the good fortune to come here; having come here, if the planting is done, the sprouting will definitely take place. It may take time, but it will definitely take place.

Just as the beingness has appeared spontaneously, you don't know beforehand, now I am going to be - it has come about - so also the talks are coming spontaneously.

This touch of "I Amness" is in each being; this beingness has that touch of love for the Absolute and it is a representation of the Absolute. When you got yourself separated from the Absolute with this identity "I Am," you felt fragmented, isolated, and that is why your demands started. In the Absolute there are no needs. Only the Absolute prevails.

The truth is total Brahman only, nothing else but Brahman. In a total Brahman state the touch of beingness, "I Am," and with that, separation started, otherness has come. But this "I Amness" is not just a small principle, that itself is the mula-maya, the primary illusion. What I am expounding is not meant for the common people, because they have not reached the stature to understand what I am saying. Therefore I tell them to do bhajans, japa, meditation. After doing that, when the purifying takes place, they will be worthy enough to receive my talks.


Q. From the Unmanifest, the manifest is happening?


M: Who is asking this and why?


Q. I want to know.


M. Nothing prevails but you, everything is you. What answer can I give you?

If you want to remember this visit, if you have love for me, remember this "I Am" principle and without the command or direction of this principle, do nothing.

In the world today there are so many people and they are so busy with their affairs that they don't have time to eat - they stand and eat. These are characteristics of the maya. The great maya principle is making you do all her tricks, and you are also abiding in what she says, and finally, that light of yours, that beingness, gets extinguished. Then where are you going?


Q. I am going to search for another body!


M: This is all a concept. Before appearing in the world, do you remember your previous history, do you remember anything?


Q. No, but I have read ...


M. I don't want to hear what others write, I want to know from the horse's mouth, from you. If you are not, can others be there? Is this not good enough for you?


Q: But I cannot think of a state when I had not been.


M. That was the non-attention Parabrahman state. That attention "I Am" was not there.


Q. Do we come from the Parabrahman state and go back after beingness goes?


M: Coming down into this world from the Absolute is something like the appearance of a dream. In a dream are you going somewhere? The primary ignorance is the understanding that you are the body. To know that you are the manifest is knowledge, and the knowledge merges into no-knowledge, Parabrahman.


Q- But I understand from the Gita ...


M: Throw it away! Whatever you understand is not the truth and it is to be thrown overboard. You are trying to catch hold of something and cling to it. Accept, as it is, what I am telling you. Don't be carried away by concepts. Don't employ any words, and look at yourself as you are. Few people understand what I am driving at.

You are not paying proper attention, you are talking only after this beingness appeared. Before the beingness was there, look at that, be in that state. If you dare call me an atheist, remember that I do bhajans four times a day.

That maya is so powerful that it gets you completely wrapped up in it. Maya means "I Am," "I love to be." It has no identity except love. That knowledge of "I Am" is the greatest foe and the greatest friend. Although it might be your greatest enemy, if you propitiate it properly, it will turn around and lead you to the highest state.



~from ‘Prior to Consciousness’ May 4, 1980

the necessary threshold is through consciousness

Nisargadatta from 'Seeds of Consciousness'

August 18, 1979

Questioner: Why is the understanding so fleeting, changing?

Maharaj: It depends on the body sense. All people will
receive the knowledge from here, but the behavior of each
will be different from that of the others.

Q: Myself, I am holding on to the same consciousness,
and the understanding which is reflected in that consciousness
is changing completely from day to day.

M: Oh yes. This knowledge, "I Am," in the field of
mind-inclination, mind-understanding, will not remain the
same. It is changing every moment. It will never stabilize
itself on one understanding.

Q: So there is no such thing as final understanding?

M: The beginning and the end of this understanding is
the knowledge "I Am." The beginning of concepts started
with the primary concept "I Am." Having wandered
through all the concepts and rejected them, you have to get
rid of this last or the first concept.

Q: That rejection-does it come by the disappearing of
the last concept, just by giving it attention?

M: See this flame of the cigarette lighter? It has appeared,
it has disappeared; it's just like that. Has it got any
concept, this flame? What is without concept is the most
perfect, the most proper. The witnessing has to be done
when you try to concentrate on an objective. Suppose you
want to concentrate on a Rama, a Krishna, or a Christ, then
there is a question of concentrating or watching. This is only
the knowledge "I Am."

Q: The problem is, the more attention I give to consciousness,
the larger the concept which appears in the mind.

M: How do you focus attention on consciousness? Consciousness
itself has to focus.

Q: That is what I meant.

M: Understand consciousness and come to the conclusion
that consciousness is not yourself.

Q: I can't. I cannot!

M: Give it up! Whatever demands you make, I am not
going to fulfill. I am not going to meet your demands. I am
not going to give you whatever you want. I am just going to
tell you, to emphasize what you are. You want to convert or
transform yourself into something: "I want to become this,"
"I am going to do that." I am going to tell you what is the
root of you, the innermost core, what you are. I am not a
sculptor, you see, I don't make images for you, so that you
become that image.

Q: Where does this need of consciousness to see itself as
everything come from?

M: You know that you are, and you love to be, hence the
necessity. Although you have been saying that you understood,
there is some hitch somewhere, isn't there?

Q: One card. I am holding back one card.

M: Throw it out! Where is the loss? Give up the game.
You listen to my talks or don't listen. You come here or
don't come here. I know what you are, what you were prior
to your "I Amness." Before your parents met, I know you. I
know your knowingness after your parents met, how it got
transformed to various stages, how it developed in different
images, I know all that. Suppose a person is a hundred
twenty-five years old; since childhood he has grown into various
stages, learned a lot worldly things. Now whatever he has
learned or gained, everything has gone, and he is lying on a
bed, and what remains now? Only that child-consciousness,
that child-ignorance, remains. And that also will go. Will it
go to heaven or hell? No; the ignorance has sprung up and
the ignorance will disappear.

Q: The question then is, if that ignorance can disappear
only through that process of time or can it be stopped now?

M: Even in between. It is sustained by food and water. If
this is not supplied it will go, disappear.

Q: But it has gone in the case of Maharaj and there is a
supply of food and water there. So what I am asking is, is
that process inevitable, or can it just end now?

M: You have to meditate. It won't be available free. The
necessary threshold is through consciousness only. You have
to imbibe and be consciousness. In the process of being in
the consciousness, you come out of it, and there you see; and
meditation is the only remedy.

Q: The more you get into consciousness, the more impossible
it seems to transcend it.

M: Give it a fair trial. Be in beingness. Try to be in
beingness. You won't get it here and now. Step number one
is: Be yourself, be in your beingness only. Although, to start
with, I am the Immanent Spirit "I Am," you have to be in
that beingness without the body sense. You feel that you are
the body now, but when you abide in that beingness you will
know then how you are without the body. But don't forget,
at the same time, that body and vital breath are very necessary.
Once you understand these three entities correctly
[body, vital breath and the message "I Am"], then you are
apart. The knower of these three entities will not be caught
by the parents.

Q: When Maharaj was immersed in his beingness, what
exactly did he understand that made him transcend
consciousness?

M: You know TV? Meditate and you will know as tangibly
as you see TV. You will see then: I am not the TV
screen, the observer of TV is not in the set. In the process of
meditation, more knowledge will be awakened, will be realized
by you, and, in the same process, you will understand
that whatever you have understood you are not.

Q: That's why I was saying before that the more consciousness
was conscious of itself, the larger the concept, the
knowledge.

M: Yes, it will happen, a living cosmos, a million universes
are in your consciousness.

Q: What about the knower?

M: The knower and whatever is known, both will go.
Nothing will remain stable, permanent. This triangle, father,
mother, and you, how did it happen? Inquire about that,
meditate on that.

Q: Isn't it the same thing, father, mother, and I; just a
flow of that consciousness?

M: Don't talk, try to understand. Just talking about eating
will not fill your stomach, you have to actually eat. You
will not get eternal peace with knowledge derived out of
words, only by Self-knowledge, Self-realization.

the immutable center

some quotes from a crucial chapter in Nisargadatta's 'I Am That:'
72. What is Pure, Unalloyed, Unattached is Real;
previously formatted as tweets for Nisargadatta_M
and now separated into basic triads for clarity.

Find the immutable center where all movement takes birth.

Just like a wheel turns round an axle, so must you be always at the axle in the center and not whirling at the periphery.

Immobility and silence are not inactive. The flower fills the space with perfume, the candle—with light.


It has nothing to do with effort. Just turn away, look between the thoughts, rather than at the thoughts.

It is all quite simple. Turn away from your desires and fears and from the thoughts they create and you are at once in your natural state.

Nothing stops you from being a jnani here and now, except fear. You are afraid of being impersonal, of impersonal being.


There is nothing to renounce. Enough if you stop acquiring.

The problem is excessive interest, leading to self-identification. Whatever you are engrossed in you take to be real.

The 'I am' in movement creates the world. The 'I am' at peace becomes the Absolute.


I am not concerned with the universe. Let it be or not be. It is enough if I know myself.

Pity the self that is, not the world that is not!

All these attributes; being, consciousness, love and beauty are reflections of the real in the world. No real—no reflection.


Change the current of your desire from taking to giving.

The passion for giving, for sharing, will naturally wash the idea of an external world out of your mind, and of giving as well.

Only the pure radiance of love will remain, beyond giving and receiving.


In love there is not the one even, how can there be two? Love is the refusal to separate, to make distinctions.

The world has only as much power over you as you give it. Rebel. Go beyond duality, make no difference between east and west.

You are eager to separate right from wrong, because you need some basis for action. You are always after doing something or other.


It is right to be oneself, it is wrong not to be. All else is conditional.

Awareness is dynamic, love is being. Awareness is love in action.

By itself the mind can actualize any number of possibilities, but unless they are prompted by love, they are valueless.


Love precedes creation. Without it there is only chaos.

Chaos is movement for movement's sake. True action does not displace; it transforms.

Just remember, nothing perceivable is real. Activity is not action. Action is hidden, unknown, unknowable. You can only know the fruit.


Through the film of your mind you project a world and also a God to give it cause and purpose. It is all imagination—step out of it.

Pure being, filling all and beyond all, is not existence which is limited. All limitation is imaginary, only the unlimited is real.

To be free in the world you must be free of the world. Otherwise your past decides for you and your future.


First return to your true being and then act from the heart of love.