Elvis Was Not a Mentalist

Thoughts on the doctrine of mentalism and the "I-thought"

By Peter Holleran

   In his last ten years after his breakup with Priscilla the King took a serious interest in the occult, astrology, the writings of H.P. Blavatsky, and even joined the Self-Realization Fellowship. (1) After reading Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda he once asked a friend to look up in the sky, announcing that he was going to use his mind to move a cloud. After a few minutes he exclaimed excitedly, did you see it, man - did you see it move?!!

   This type of expectation is often associated with a beginners first introduction to the teachings of mentalism. Too much ingestion of ayahuasca on excursions to Peru, too much reading of Carlos Castaneda, and even the random occurence of such phenomenon may lead one to a mistaken understanding of this ancient philosophic doctrine, recently updated for our times by V.S. Iyer and Paul Brunton (PB), and further extrapolated on by Anthony Damiani. In this article I will offer a few thoughts of my own on what mentalism both is and is not, and what the I-thought, spoken of by the sage Ramana Maharshi, both is and is not. I will explore another way of looking at the nature of this so-called I-thought that may be more in line with our actual experience than just considering it as a thought! Also, what does seeing the world as a dream have to do with mentalism and realization, and how do feeling and willing - as contrasted with thinking - relate to the concept of the ego? Is the ego only a thought, or a bunch of thoughts, albeit strongly held ones? It will be suggested that the thinking of I is intimately related to the feeling of "I", and the "willing of "I" (or the primal act of self-will), and that in the end it is a mysterious thing that defies categorization but nevertheless impacts all of our experiencing. Further, only such a three-part mode of looking at it will provide any hope, certainly for westerners, of fulfilling a sadhana based on the famous who am I? enquiry of the Maharshi.

   What Is Mentalism?

   Damiani states:

   His first mental act is to think himself into being. He is the maker of his own I. This does not mean that the ego is his own personal invention alone. The whole world-process brings everything about, including the ego and the egos own self-making. (PB V6, 8:2.15) Thats mentalism in a nutshell. Thats the whole mentalistic doctrine. The Soul has for its content the World-Idea, and it actualizes that or projects that World-Idea out from within itself. And included in that World-Idea is the ego and the process that its going to go through. (2)

   PB further elaborates:

   "Every presented thing which is seen smelled, heard, felt, or tasted, no less than every representative thought, idea, name, or image, is entirely mental. The streets of busy towns and the forests of lonely mountains are all, without exception, mere constructs of the imagining faculty."

   "It is asked why, if the world is like a dream or a hallucination, we all have the same dream or suffer the same hallucination. Why do we project it in common instead of independently, since we all do have quite different dreams when asleep at night or quite different reveries when awake by day? The answer is that there is another and vaster Mind behind our personal minds which imposes the same world-image upon them all, so that all see it and live in it. Moreover, they are of necessity themselves projected by this Mind so that this image is not less real for them than their own selves. The mind makes for itself this world of illusion, this stage of space and time and form. But it does not make it independently of all prompting. For the image that it constructs is imposed upon it - or projected into it - by the Mind behind it."

   "A popular misconception of mentalism must be cleared. When we say that the world does not exist for man apart from his own mind, this is not to say that man is the sole world-creator. If that were so he could easily play the magician and reshape a hampering environment in a day. NO! - what mentalism really teaches is that man's mind perceives, by participating in it, the world-image which the World-Mind creates and holds. Man alone is not responsible for this image, which could not possibly exist if it did not exist also in the World-Mind's consciousness." (3)

   PBs teacher, V.S. Iyer, told him:

   Point out that the truth of idealism can become clear only by eliminating the ego; otherwise people will ask, Why cant I create a world by thought, thus falling into solipsism. (Commentaries, Vol. 1 , p. 225)

   Just as Christian doctrine teaches that God is the very Soul of the Soul, therefore, and as Plotinus posits an Absolute Soul in and as which individual Souls derive their existence, so also do individual minds exist within one absolute Mind. Thus mentalism is not a form of solipsism where the apparent individual is the sole creator of his own universe - although it will be admitted, as these are mere words, or "fingers pointing to the moon," that the entire affair will remain full of mystery and paradox.

   PB continues:

   The ego is a structure which has been built up in former lives from tendencies, habits, and experiences in a particular pattern. But in the end the whole thing is nothing but a thought, albeit a strong and continuing thought. (v6, 8:2.44)...All the former tendencies that you have are actualizing themselves as this thought... (4)

   O.K. Right there we can establish one principle about mentalism: It is not something you can use as an ego to feather your own nest. The ego is a bunch of habit energies or tendencies that create the illusion or tentative sense of an I conjoined with a body, but which is itself actually the product of the entire cosmos. The spiritual process, in part, is to universalize the ego to include the entire World-Idea, thus evolving to an impersonal point of view. That could be a process of lifetimes.

   So, to give an example, let's consider this question: "did I write this article?" The answer is, "yes and no." Damiani says:

   ....when youre working out the meaning of the doctrine in all its implications, and youre trying to make it explicit, youll find that you cant do it under your own power. Its only when this higher power within you, the Overself, starts taking a hand in the game, that you start finding the material you need to answer certain questions, and you find other material to provoke you into asking certain questions, and so this mysterious process keeps going on. When a person is under that kind of surveillance by the higher Power, you can almost say the Logos is working its meaning out in that person, and the person will become conscious of that. (5)

   This entire website was created two years ago during a period when Uranus was transitting conjunct my natal Mercury. The ideas flew out of me almost without effort. Of course, there were some experiences to draw upon, and years of study with a lot of concepts in the tank, but this "I" needed the cosmic energy to "package" them into something creative and hopefully useful. In addition, natal Sun-Mercury-Venus-Mars in Pisces are in the third house, which is currently being activated by an exact square from Pluto, as well as the conjunction from Uranus, and the present crop of articles, to unsuspecting eyes seemingly being created at a furious rate, are themselves a product of this vulcanic pressure and electric stimulus. This "I" receives ideas and essentially HAS to write them down before it can get any rest. According to the PB-Damiani-Plotinus version of mentalism, it is the World-Mind with its World-Idea, essentially the entire cosmos, represented in large measure by these trans-Saturnian planets, which is impressing this body-mind (itself a product of that World-Idea), with its own ideas. They don't originate in this little brain, right? How, therefore, can I say that I am due all the credit? So a correct understanding of mentalism can help keep you a little humble. PB says:

   Each individual Soul projects the World-Idea, but first it must have the intermediary of an ego through which the world gets projected. All [of] that exists within the Overself, within the Soul itself [or Soul identified with Nature]. (6)

   Moreover,

   The ego to which he is so attached turns out on enquiry to be none other than the presence of the World-Mind within his own heart. If identification is then shifted by constant practice from one to the other, he has achieved the purpose of life. (7)

   So we see that, contrary to most historical descriptions of the spiritual process, the ego itself is not actually destroyed, even upon awakening, although its tyrannical sway is lessened over time by the power of conscious awakening. The ego itself, however, is inseparable from our unlimited, infinite Conscious nature. Direct assault techniques to "kill" it - as in the traditional dissociative 'hypermasculine dharmas', as described by Saniel Bonder, author of Waking Down - are usually found unsatisfactory and wanting in transformative power. Brunton continues:

   "Unless the human ego were itself an emanation of the Overself it would be quite unable to identify with the sensation of severance from the body during the process we call dying." (8)

   So it is a very complex situation. On one hand the ego is seen as something that separates us from the Universal Benevolence, and on the other hand it is part of the evolutionary world-process and connected with the Soul itself.

   The Soul doesnt do anything, it is Being, therefore to try and move a cloud, or a mountain, with its power, is off the mark. Mentalism simply and rightfully means the realization that all arises in consciousness, or Mind, not that we personally think everything, or can think anything, into being. What happens depends on many factors, and lots of things happen that I never thought of and dont happen that I did think of. Satya Sai Baba (the one with the Afro) was known to manifest vibhuti, or sacred ash, in his palms - but did anybody ever ask him to make a ham - er, vegieburger? - just kidding. But you get the point. Mentalism gets rid of the concept of independently existing matter, by pointing out that that is something that is unknowable, because we cannot know or experience anything outside of our consciousness of it. But the role of our individual mind, certainly at the level of the ego, is participatory, as it were, in the Universal Mind, and not a capricious creator on its own.

   Generally when you speak about mentalism to people they get the strange idea that you are denying the existence of a certain object, whereas what he [PB] is saying is: No, we are just telling you what the object is. It is a thought. We are not denying its existence, we are explaining it. (9)

   Often we get hung up, I feel, because our idea of a thought is itself a mental or intellectual concept. Do we reallly know what a thought IS? From the position of the philosophy of Drik, or the essence of mentalism, as taught by Iyer or P.B., thoughts, feelings, perceptions, conceptions, are ALL mental. That is, anything presenting to consciousness is considered as mental, as opposed to material, or some stuff separate from consciousness. Pain is mental, too. That is important, because how many times do we say to ourselves when we are suffering, to hell with it is just a thought, it is a feeling! I'm frickin' HURTING!!! Perhaps this conclusion is the result of hundreds of lives of crystalizing ignorant thoughts, leading to ignorant behavior, leading to ignorant and inevitable results in the form of inauspicious feelings and karma, but in that moment, how many of us can truly see it as a thought? Yet, if we know that anything presenting to consciousness is just that, i.e., something presenting and arising in and as, and to consciousness, then at least the idea of dualism itself has been dented and lessened in intensity a little, even if we can't agree that pain is a thought.

   To see the world as an idea often takes quite some time. It can happen through mystical experience or directly through intense thinking:

   "PB says somewhere that first he had the mystical experience of mentalism and then he was able to explain it. It can be reversed, too. You can study these things for many years and then get the mystical experience of the truth of these doctrines. Usually it happens that way. You have to spend many years in profound study and reflection and then you get the experience of the world as an idea, but only after you have gone through a very lengthy study."

   "The idea of meditation is to teach your mind to be very calm, very quiet and go into itself.? Also, in meditation your thinking has to get very very sharp like a surgeon's knife.? You can't make a mistake because if you slip you are going to come up with the wrong notions.? So the development of your rational faculty, the ability to concentrate for long periods of time - the ability to keep the mind quiet and still: all these things are necessary to realize and bring about the truth of who you are and what the world is. (Anthony Damiani 8/83)

   One more point. This little ego of ours is evolving, at the same time one is moved to transcend it. The words can be confusing, because some of the 'advaitic fundamentalists' will argue that there is no ego in the first place, so there is no one to transform or transcend it. So be it. Let it simply be as PB said:

   "How can man fully express himself unless he fully develops himself? The spiritual evolution which requires him to abandon the ego runs parallel to the mental evolution which requires him to perfect it...The ego is a part of the divine order of existence. It must emerge, grow, enslave, and finally be enslaved..."(10)

   Man is in the make; only the 'holy' fool gets permanently enlightened. Eckhart Tolle said, in A New Earth,

   "Awakened doing is the alignment of your outer purpose - what you do - with your inner purpose - awakening and staying awake. Through awakened doing, you become one with the outgoing purpose of the universe. Consciousness flows through you into this world. It flows into your thoughts and inspires them. It flows into what you do and guides and empowers it. Not what you do, but how you do what you do determines whether you are fulfilling your destiny. And how you do what you do is determined by your state of consciousness." (11)

   This is much the same as what Anthony Damiani wrote, commenting on words of PB:

   "There is a special uniqueness that an individual lives, and the closer it conforms to the World-Idea, the closer it conforms to the great Uniqueness. Your ego is part and parcel of the World-Idea. As it evolves it will conform more and not less to the World-Idea. Eventually you'll be pushed right into the World-Idea and be like part and parcel of the World-Idea. Then you are the great Uniqueness." (12)

   What Is the "I-thought?"

   Aside from increasing ones basic understanding through study, reflection, etc, what is the task of the aspirant, then, regarding spiritual practice ? What does one make of Ramanas famous Who Am I enquiry? Is the I-thought really a thought as commonly conceived? - or is it more akin to an I-feeling, or the feeling of I ? Can we look at it as that? If we do, then we see what Ramana was trying to move people towards with the enquiry, which he said was the same as bhakti or devotion, namely: a submission to the core of ones being. Specifically, he often spoke of a phase of the enquiry (and sometimes equated this phase with the real enquiry itself, all the rest being but preliminary) as contacting the aham sphurana, which was the current of I, "pulsating", "throbbing, and which would lead one to the Heart, and consequently liberation. Most of the time Ramana spoke as if intense introversion was necessary for this, and, indeed, that was his initial experience. Lakshmana Swamy, a well-known disciple, argued similarly that unless the mind sinks into the heart and dies, there is no realization. He, too, used the language of the I-thought, but Ramana at times alternated between that and referring to a "feeling. For instance, he said:

   So long as there is doubt or the feeling of non-realization, an attempt must be made to rid oneself of these thoughts. (13)

In either case, it requires a great capacity for inversion to achieve the goal under this understanding of the process. Ramana often stressed that the "I-thought" must be "pure":

M...The real Self is the Infinite "I-I," i.e., "I" is perfection. It is eternal. It has no origin and no end. The other "I" is born and also dies. It is impermanent. See to whom are the changing thoughts. They will be found to arise after the "I"-thought. Hold the "I"-thought. They subside. Trace back the source of the "I"-thought. The Self alone will remain."
D. It is difficult to follow. I understand he theory. But what is the practice?
M. The other methods are meant for those who cannot take to the investigation of the Self. Even to repeat Aham Brahmasmi or think of it, a doer is necessary. Who is it? It is "I." Be that "I." It is the direct method. The other methods also will ultimately lead everyone to this method of investigation of the Self.
D. I am aware of the "I." Yet my troubles are not over.
M. This "I"-thought is not pure. It is contaminated by association with the body and senses. See to whom the trouble is. It is to the "I"-thought. Hold it. Then the other thoughts vanish.
D. Yes. How to do it? That is the whole trouble.
M. Think "I" "I" "I" and hold to that one thought to the exclusion of all others." (14)

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   The reader is directed to the article by David Godman on Ramana Maharshi entitled The I and the I-I for a discussion of this subject. It would be good to read that before proceeding further.

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   To recap, Ramana alternates between seeming to advocate deep, one-pointed introversion, and also simply seeing that there is no "I". Again, Ramana sometimes argued that deep inversion wasnt necessary, and was at most a stage along the way. He is famous for saying:

   Destroy the ego by seeking its identity. Because the ego is no entity, it will automatically vanish and the Reality will shine forth of itself. This is the direct method, while all other methods are done retaining the ego....in this method, the final question is the only one and is raised from the beginning. No sadhanas are necessary for engaging this quest.

   "There is no greater mystery than the following: Ourselves being the Reality, we seek to gain reality. We think [there is that word again] there is something hiding our reality, and that it must be destroyed before the reality is gained. That is ridiculous. A day will dawn when you will yourself laugh at your past efforts. That which will be on that day you laugh is also here and now. (15)

   Again, people read in the books, hearing, reflection and one-pointedness are necessary. They think that they must pass through savikalpa samadhi and nirvikalpa samadhi before attaining realization. Hence all these questions. Why should they wander in that maze? What do they gain in the end? It is only cessation of the trouble of seeking. They find that the Self is eternal and self-evident. Why should they not get that repose even in this very moment? (16)

   When the non-self disappears, the Self alone remains. To make room anywhere, it is enough that things are removed. Room is not brought in afresh. Nay, whats more - room is there even when crowded. (17)

   This latter comment - "room is there even when crowded" - to me means that the Void, or Emptiness, is always the case and can be realized whether or not there are thoughts, a thought-free state, apparent inversion or extroversion. The non-dualists concur on this. PB spoke in two different ways as well. In his earlier works, and parts of the Notebooks, he talks of inverting and isolating , or tracking the ego down to its lair, in the interior, formless void, where it can be dealt a knock-out blow, which in this case would be nirvikalpa samadhi. That is virtually identical to the advise of Ramana to catch hold of the ego, or I-thought, contact the aham sphurana, and follow that into the Self. PB and Ramana both also made it clear, however, that even repeated nirvikalpa samadhi was not sufficient to eradicate the ego or to attain reality, for which was proposed the further stabilization into sahaj samadhi. PB later went so far as to admit that the intial achievement of trance was not even necessary for this. Something just as exacting and demanding, however, was required to achieve such a state, which he called the exterior equivalent of attaining the void, which was detachment (see Essays on the Quest). This must be simultaneously practiced in order to stabilize ones realization into sahaj in any case.

   Of course, the beginner must be cautious here , because without allowing some attachment (!) in the first place, how will he learn how to love, to serve, and so on? How could he do so by merely by employing a motivated or even ascetic strategy of detachment, which is really only his concept of detachment? So there is a paradox here that must be well understood. In what sense does PB mean "detachment", when there is in truth no self or "entity" to be detached or separate from anything? That is a good subject for another essay.

   Most contemporary non-dualists have not had, and are not capable of the concentrative depth of nirvikalpa samadhi, nor do most of them argue that such is necessary in order to realize ones true nature, Emptiness, Reality, or Mind. In some cases they even argue that no form of practice or purification is necessary either. In that respect I feel they are mistaken, accept in more or less rare cases. A more typical advaitic example is that of contemporary teacher Stephen Wingate. He writes:

   "Saying that nothing can be done to alleviate suffering in order to remain true to the concept of non-duality makes what can be a potent tool into a sterile and lifeless religious philosophy. It sounds good when read in a book, but it becomes impractical and dead. On the other hand, suggesting that we do more than question the primary misconception that 'I am a separate, limited person' is counter-productive... [It ] only adds to the sense of personal doership, which is the core problem and cause of suffering." (18)

   The late American sage Robert Adams, a direct disciple of Ramana Maharshi, speaks on the dilemma for the teacher of non-duality:

   "If you have to meditate, by all means, meditate. This path is never against any other method, due to the fact that they all eventually lead to awakening. You have to do whatever you have to do. But for those who can understand what I'm talking about, and realize that you're dealing with no mind, no body, no world, no universe, no God, the awakening comes immediately because there is no one who is sleeping. Do you follow this? If you think you've got something to overcome, if you believe that you've got to work on yourself, you've got to make some kind of effort, it will be hard. After all, who makes the effort? The ego. Who is telling you all these things you have to overcome? The mind. You think you have to overcome your bad habits, you have to overcome past karmas, you have to overcome samskaras. That's all a lie."

   "I realize that I talk about these things sometimes. It sounds like a contradiction, but I am sharing with you the highest truth. There are no samskaras to overcome, because they never existed. There is no karma to overcome because it doesn't exist. But it does for the immature students. They have to work on something. So I explain to them there's karma, there are samskaras, there are latent tendencies that have got hold of you, and you have to transcend them. Yet I'm telling them a lie. But they really need to hear that at this time of their evolution, otherwise they cannot work on anything else." (19)

   The reasoning for the five-fold quest as outlined by PB (moral transformation, altruistic activity, religious veneration, metaphysical reflection, and mystical contemplation), goes back to the discussion on the nature of the ego, as well as an understanding that the path is one of many lifetimes, calling for a complete development, and not just the elimination of psychological suffering in this one, which at times appears to be the point of view of many of the newer non-dual teachers. If instead of calling the ego the I-thought (which can give the impression that it is just something in "the head"), we think of it as at least threefold, that is, a primal I-thought, a primal feeling of I, and a primal act of self-will, then we will see the necessity for practice, and the inevitability of an ordeal, due to the accumulated habit energies and tendencies from time immemorable.

   PB wrote:

   "He will advance most on the Quest who tries most to separate himself from his ego. It will be a long, slow struggle and a hard one, for the belief that the ego is his true self grips him with hypnotic intensity. All the strength of all his being must be brought to this struggle to remove error and to establish truth, for it is an error not merely of the intellect alone but of the emotions and the will." (20)

   He hints at the Short Path and gives a nod to the non-dualists here when he indicates that it is the "belief" that the ego is his true self which stands in his way, but puts emphasis on the fact that this belief is reinforced by a life of maladaptation in thinking, feeling, and willing. He says:

   "Ramana Maharshi was quite right. Pruning the ego of some faults will only be followed by the appearance and growth of new faults! Of what use is it so long as the ego remains alive?...But although Maharshi was right, his teaching gives only part of Truth's picture. Presented by itself, and without the other part, it is not only incomplete but may even become misleading. By itself it seems to indicate that there is no need to work on our specific weaknesses, that they can be left untouched while we concentrate on the essential thing - rooting out the ego. But where are the seekers who can straight away root it out? For the very strength of purpose and power of concentration needed for this uprooting will be sapped by their faults." (21)

   PB's teacher, vedantist V.S. Iyer, made the very same observation. One must work on ones faults in order to gain the universal vision desired by self-inquiry, and not wait until one is realized for their demonstration.

   In Essays on the Quest, PB also explains:

   "He may think that eradication of personal faults has little to do with finding the true self, but this is not correct. These very faults arise out of the false conception of the 'I'. Moreover the eradication is suggested not only to help him to overcome such false conceptions but also to help him become a better servant of humanity." (22)

   He, therefore, even goes so far as to say,

   "At a certain stage of development, it is more important to work hard at self-improvement and to detect hidden weaknesses and remedy them than to attempt anything else." (23)

   "He himself has sought this self-cleansing. He must be prepared to witness the rising up to the surface of negative qualities that have lain inert or only self-active, as well as the throwing into focus by outer events those which have already been fully active. He will now have to deal with these qualities, usually one at a time, and to deal with them repeatedly so long as they are not thoroughly transmuted. it is all a part of the work of purification, resulting from the co-operation of his own higher self. (24)

   Alan Jacobs, in Advaita and Western Neo-Advaita, writes:

   "In fact the 'ghost of the me' doesn't really exist as an entity, this is true, but the notion of 'the false me' is very powerfully fueled subconsciously by the selfish-will and compounded by the vital force...It has to be diligently enquired into to be destroyed. The Maharshi says emphatically that our only freedom as an ajnani is to turn inwards. It is not trying 'to get something', it is rather trying to 'get rid of something', the sense of separation, i.e. identification with the thoughts, mind and feelings. Otherwise there is a permanent occlusion, the Granthi Knot, permanently screening off the tremendous power of the Real Self, which is the Absolute Unborn Deathless Consciousness, God, Unconditional Love, Dynamic Silence, and Oneness."

   This may also be why the Tibetans say:

   Do not make mistake understanding for realization, and do not mistake realization for liberation.

   And also why the Lankavatara Sutra speaks of the turnabout in the deep seat of understanding, as well as the inconceivable transformation death of the Bodhisattvas individualized will-control.

   We might remember that the Divine Mind is often spoken of in terms of three attributes: "Sat-Chit-Ananda", or "Being-Awareness-Bliss", but also as "Light, Life, and Love". In Dzogchen the three kayas or aspects of Mind are "Empty Essence, Radiant Nature, and All-Pervading Energy". The masters of Sant Mat sometimes add "Word, Life-Impulse, and Power". Considering things only in terms of thought as we know it can make it all seem rather dull. This is partly due to Descartes who split western thought into an unhealthy dichotomy of idealism and realism, at the same time eviscerating the multi-level ensouled cosmos of the ancients. It IS a living Mind we are talking about, after all, not just some ghostly thoughts in the head. So the above suggestion may have practical and inspirational merit, even if the system of mentalism is logically unassailable or metaphysically true, and even convincing in ones most sattvic moments.

   Let me try to summarize some of this thinking. Anthony Damiani does a great job in Standing In Your Own Way in describing a process whereby the ego in meditation is approaching its primal lair, as PB might say, getting isolated from all its bodies and limiting adjuncts up to the threshold of the Void, and he then asks his students to pinpoint exactly what it is that is then to be surrendered, and to what, and HOW. Anthony says here the ego is beyond reason, thought, body and emotions, and is flying blind. It hasnt entered the final battle yet, but is close. A problem is that the ego now has no knowledge that there is an Overself, or a benevolent something to take its place in the Void, which represents its extinction. What must it then do? What must surrender?

   Now, it stands alone and isolated. Separated off from everything else. The point Im making is: Now youre encapsulated within that, what do you do? Are you willing to give it up? No. Of course not, because the only thing that surrounds you is nothingness and an abyss, Youre encapsulated now in the ego structure which we distinguished and separated off from the reasoning phase of the soul and the higher phase of the soul youre going to surrender? You wont do it. You might be forced into doing it and then your prior discipline and training might come to your aid, but youre not going to do it willingly.

   The important thing is to see that you stand alone in that isolated capsule and that within, there, is where the self-will is going to try to surrender itself. But what will it surrender to? How will it cancel itself out? To whom? PB says to the higher self. Right. But when youre in there you dont know that theres a higher self. (25)

   What distinguishes the ego is its self-will. If you introspect into yourself, moment by moment you are actualizing yourself through that self-will, and thats what will have to surrender itself. Now, how could the self-will surrender itself? It has to be brought to do so. It cant do so on its own. (26)

   This obviously implies grace. Now, in addition, based on all we have said so far it may be the case that a similar process can and must happen when one is NOT in an introverted state. This would be the long drawn out affair PB describes as the whittling down of the ego, or learning detachment, or perhaps better stated as "interdependency" or "no-separation", which he calls an equivalent to entering the Void. This could be just as profound in nature as that described above for the terminal phase of the meditative process, and of course more painful inasmuch as the body is involved. [Just a thought to ponder here, however: "who" learns detachment?, "who" gets undone? Me? Who am I? Is there any such person?! Even this is a paradox.] Fear, sorrow, anger, resistance, refusal, unlove, and all the rest must be faced to be transformed at the heart and allow the ego or the false identification, thought, and feeling of I, a bunch of tendencies contracting around an imaginary or empty center, to finally be undone and allow the true heart-centre to flower and unite the unmanifest with the manifest in a living way. And at the exact point of the more extreme moments when the letting go must take place, the ego [who?!] has no security that the divine will take its place if it does so, just like it has no such assurance when it is facing the void. Both moments are difficult and a test of faith. To a degree this outer letting go [but, again, "who" lets go?] must continue even after nirvikalpa (if one has the potential for or pursues a sadhana to achieve that), for re-identification upon exiting trance will necessitate the development of stable insight into reality. I will take the liberty here of transposing words of Anthony to this scenario:

   Question: Is it possible that true surrender takes place without your really knowing it? - Dont worry. It will be the most agonizing thing youve ever gone through. (27)

   PB speaks of the need for the egoism to be completely crushed out of a man. I know, Adyashanti sometimes speaks differently. He feels that such a belief system about a spiritual battle has been built up in the traditions that prevents ordinary people from getting realized. Well, that may be true, but no one said you have to go looking for it. It will find you if it has to. Adya also says that ones ego must be ground down to ash. I think each person has to see where they are at, therefore, and what is true for them, but also know that there is precedent for much of what has been quoted here:

   When God crucifies in the inmost part of the Soul, no creature is able to comfort it. (28)

     - Michael Molinos

   "...nothing so much wounds our self-love. It is a holocaust in which it is completely consumed by the fire of divine love. You must not then be surprised at the violent resistance it offers, especially when the soul experiences mortal anguish in receiving the death-blow to this self-love. The suffering one feels then is like that of a person in agony, and it is only through this painful agony and by the spiritual death which follows it that one can arrive at the fullness of divine life and an intimate union with God...For the time that these crucifying operations continue, the understanding, the memory and the will are in a fearful void, in nothingness. Love this immense void since God deigns to fill it; love this nothingness since the infinitude of God is there. (29)

     - Jean-Pierre deCaussade

   Imagine feeling the worse betrayal, the worst mortal blow or disappointment of your life. Feel the crushing pressure in your chest. Then imagine what it might be like to actually have a heart attack. As the spokes of your being gather in one central place or point, feel your life ebbing away or concentrating there. Now consider how maybe the truth of what the ego is lies somewhere within this experience. Feels like more than just a "thought", doesn't it? Certainly like more than what our concept of a thought is, at any rate. To the advaitic philosopher, feelings, perceptions, are all thoughts, too, that is, appearances to consciousness.

   This is just an extreme example of my own posed to suggest the tenacity of this "thought". It is not one's usual experience or a model for practice. For this each person must find what form or description of his sense of self fits for his particular inquiry if it is to be fruitful. Simply inquiring "who am I' is useless if it doesn't resonate within oneself. Maharshi once said to a disciple to consider, not "who am I?", but rather, "what is this 'me'?" Whatever phrase most closely fits what one feels to be himself as a separate entity is likely to be a useful form of inquiry. It must really grab you. And it IS a form of inquiry, not, as Ramana emphasized, a rote question or mantra - one is to look and see and find out if what he thinks is himself is true or not.

   Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, in I Am That, seemed to concur with Ramana that the inquiry is into not only the "thought" of "I", but also the "feeling" or basic sense of "I". This eliminates some possible confusion:

   Refuse all thoughts except one: the thought 'I am'. The mind will rebel in the beginning, but with patience and perseverance it will yield and keep quiet. Once you are quiet, things will begin to happen spontaneously and quite naturally, without any interference on your part. Just keep in mind the feeling 'I am', merge in it, till your mind and feeling become one. By repeated attempts you will stumble on the right balance of attention and affection and your mind will be firmly established in the thought-feeling 'I am'. Whatever you think, say, or do, this sense of immutable and affectionate being remains as the ever-present background of the mind. To know what you are you must first investigate and know what you are not. And to know what you are not you must watch yourself carefully, rejecting all that does not necessarily go with the basic fact: 'I am'. ... Separate consistently and perseveringly the 'I am' from 'this' or 'that', and try to feel what it means to be, just to be, without being 'this' or 'that'.

   Give up all questions except one: 'Who am I'? After all, the only fact you are sure of is that you are. The 'I am' is certain. The 'I am this' is not. Struggle to find out what you are in reality. Cling to one thing, that matters, hold on to 'I am' and let go all else. This is sadhana. In realization there is nothing to hold on to and nothing to forget. Everything is known, nothing is remembered....just remember yourself. 'I am', is enough to heal your mind and take you beyond. Just have some trust. (30)

   Nisargadatta advised one to hold onto that thought or feeling" (Ramana said to "hold onto the ego"), which, strangely, will take one to realization, the source of the "I am", by grace:

   "You live, you feel, you think. By giving attention to your living, feeling and thinking, you free yourself from them and go beyond them. Your personality dissolves and only the witness remains. Then you go beyond the witness [the "I am"]. Do not ask how it happens. Just search within yourself....What do you love now? The 'I am'. Give your heart and mind to it, think of nothing else. This, when effortless and natural, is the highest state. In it love itself is the lover and the beloved. Before the world was, consciousness was. In consciousness it comes into being, in consciousness it lasts and into pure consciousness it dissolves. At the root of everything, is the feeling 'I am'....Relax and watch the "I am". Reality is just behind it. Keep quiet, keep silent; it will emerge, or, rather, it will take you in." (31)

   Sri Nisargadatta asks us to get creative and fully open up the inquiry by questioning many assumptions we take for granted:

   "Begin to question. The most obvious things are the most doubtful. Ask yourself such questions as: 'Was I really born?' 'Am I really so-and-so?' 'How do I kow that I exist?' 'Who are my parents?' 'Have they created me, or have I created them?' 'Must I believe all I am told about myself?' 'Who am I. anyhow?'...All hangs on the idea 'I am'. Examine it very thoroughly. It lies at the root of every trouble." (32)

   To a questioner who asked whether it was necessary in the beginning to pray and meditate for some time before being ready for this inquiry, Nisargadatta responded:

   "If you believe so, go on. To me, all delay is a waste of time. You can skip all the preparation and go directly for the ultimate search within. Of all the Yogas, it is the simplest and the shortest." (33)

   Let's try to summarize a few points here. One, the doctrine of Mentalism explains, but does not explain away, the world and the ego. It reconciles duality with "not-duality" and finally "non-duality". It does not give fuel to the idea that no practice is necessary, only that reality is always the case and not elsewhere.

   Two, the I-thought is a confusing idea and may be less than fruitful for some practitioners to focus on. People may say to themselves Who am I, Who am I for years - and never are. It is easy to confuse the notion of thoughts emanating out of the head or brain with the fundamental perception or feeling that is the true import of the phrase, the I-thought. It often takes quite a lot of maturing and practice to get a grip on, or to "hold on to", the ego or I-thought as Maharshi advised,in order to finally rest easy as the "I am" - the source of the 'I-thought'. According to Anthony and PB, we need a broad understanding of what this ego actually is, how it functions, its many disguises, and so forth, to succeed in objectifying it, so it can be consistently disidentified with.

   Three, for westerners particularly, focussing too much on finding the source of the I-thought within may lead to an inability or unnecessary delay in discovering what is going on without! It may focus attention more on the ego, in a negative sense, wherefore it may perhaps for some be more appropriate to spend some time contemplating WHAT Am I? and WHAT Is This? before WHO Am I?. That is, a study of the philosophic doctrines with some depth may give a broader understanding of what is to be accomplished and the true nature of the problem (if any) that is before us. When subjective egoity based on a wrong relationship with the world is purified, then "Who AM I?", without Ramana sitting right in front of you, may be more productive. In PB's terminology, the emanent that the Soul is projecting, the re-embodying Soul, or the ego, a "unit of life" or complex karmic stream, evolves and gets purified, "becomes wisdom" by experiencing and being part of the World-Idea, at some point gets 'ripe', and through enquiry or surrender reunites with its source, the divine Overself. It is not merged forever or annihilated in God as common mysticism teaches (the fallacy of divine identity), but remains a dedicated servant of its higher self. These are words, and, no doubt, difficult to intellectually reconcile with the ultimate arguments of the ajatavada (no creation, no causality) advaitists. Nevertheless, the main point is that if one merely negates his experiences because of a simplistic and incomplete doctrine about the ego (i.e., it is unreal, etc.) he will not continue to grow.

   V.S. Iyer said that one must start with examining the world in front of one. First, understand that it is an idea. Then know that the body is an idea. Finally, understand that the ego-I is an idea. Knowing these are ideas effectively dissolves them into Mind or Consciousness. This is a form of gyan samadhi, without trance, in which one realizes the Atman. Starting with "who am I," says Iyer, assumes there is such a thing and that we know what it is. But there isn't and we don't. So "who am I" is misleading. As Ramana sometimes said instead, "what is this me?" is a more accurate question. When all of this is abidingly established in oneself, then one can then know the real "I", which is Brahman. "I and "world" are known as Brahman. That is the true "I". [See Iyer, Commentaries (ed. Mark Scorelle, 1999) for more on Iyer's thought].

   Adyashanti spoke of this brilliantly. He said:

   "Inexplicably it comes. When you least expect it. For a reason you can never know. One moment you are striving, figuring, imagining, and then, in the blink of an eye, it all disappears. The struggle disappears. The striving disappears. The person disappears. The world disappears. Everything disappears, and the person is like a pinpoint of light, just receding until it disappears. And there's nobody there to witness it. The person is gone. Only, only awareness remains. Nothing else. No one to be aware. Nothing to be aware of. Only that remains itself. Then it's understood, finally and simply. [PB called this "one of the unforgetable meditations"]

Then everythingall the struggle, all the striving, all the thinking, all the figuring, all the surrendering, all the letting go, all the grabbing hold of, all the praying, all the begging, all the cursing, toowas just a distraction. And only then is it seen that the person was, is, and ever will be no more than a thought. With a single thought, the person seems to reemerge. With more thoughts, the world seems to reemerge right out of nothing. But now you know.

The incarnation is nothing more than a thought. A thousand incarnations are but a thousand thoughts. And this amazing miracle of a mirage we call the world reappears as it was before, but now you know. That's why you usually have a good laugh, because you realize that all your struggles were made up. You conjured them up out of nothingwith a thought that was linked to another thought, that was then believed, that linked to another thought that was then believed. But never could it have been true, not for a second could it have actually existed. Not ever could you have actually suffered for a reason that was trueonly through an imagination, good, bad, indifferent. The intricacies of spiritual philosophy and theologies are just a thought within Emptiness.

And so at times we talk, and I pretend to take your struggles seriously, just as I pretended to take my own seriously. You may pretend to take your own struggles seriously from time to time, and although we pretend, we really shouldn't forget that we are pretending, that we are making up the content of our experience; we are making up the little dramas of our lives. We are making up whether we need to hold on or surrender or figure it out or pray to God or be purified or have karma cleansedit's all a thought. We just collude in this ridiculous charade of an illusion pretending that it's real, only to reveal that it's not. There is no karma. There is nothing really to purify. There's no problem. There is only what you create and believe to be so. And if you like it that way, have at it!

But we cannot continue this absolute farce indefinitely. We cannot continue to pretend this game we play, indefinitely. It's impossible. Everything comes back to nothing.

And then it's a bit harder to hold a straight face consistently for the rest of your life." (34)

   PB, according to Anthony, was supposedly "in agony" even after realizing Nirvikalpa. How could that be if he had thus 'tracked the ego down to its lair' and had his egoism slain once and for all? There must be more to this picture, therefore, than at first appears. In Nirvikalpa the ego may be dealt a "knock-out blow", but in most instances it is revived and gets up from the mat, hopefully a bit more sober, but still active and not understood fully.

   Fourth, considering the ego as threefold, therefore, as thought, feeling, and self-will, which somehow the King within (no, not Elvis, but the Grace of the Overself), brings to a mysterious and enigmatic conclusion, may be more useful. PB wrote that the fulfillment and balancing of the three functions of thinking, feeling, and willing by the ego would spontaneously ignite mystic forces within, leading to a the superior and inconceivable faculty of spiritual insight. Thus, Who am I is not some mystic short-cut, or easily fulfilled practice, for most people. One must be ripe for it, generally through various practices, studies, and disciplines of the quest. For others, as suggested above, more individualized forms of inquiry, or, if you will, questions to ponder, may be more useful.

   As a help, we might contemplate on the following: Do we know what a thought is? Do we "know" what a feeling is? Do we "know" what self-will is? Do we "know what anything is? We will find the answer is a resounding "No!" All we have are concepts about what they are. If we can drop the concepts and abide for some time in the ignorance left in their wake, we may find we might make some headway, or actually dwell in the ignorance, the "no-thing", of what we are. This was the approach of Nisargadatta. And that is the result of the inquiry. That is the answer. It will not come to the mind. Realize that you are the presence, the simple awareness, conscious itself, and abide as that. Find out for yourself, that is, inquire, if there is really a self anywhere, and rest more and more in the answer to that inquiry. Of course, there will be no answer(!), although there may be a response (of grace). Even Ramana said as much. YOU are the answer. The mind will never know it. Aham sphurana or no aham sphurana, when the "I-thought", the "I-feeling", and the "self-will" finally die or resolve in the heart it will be in a mysterious silence beyond all concepts and knowledge. Sages suggest, why not then get used to it now, little by little?

   What about the experience of perceiving that the world is like a dream? Many have had this experience, but miss recognizing it as a taste of mentalism while they await the achievement of trance, nirvikalpa, sahaj, etc, which is unfortunate, as most of us westerners are never going to get nirvikalpa, short of dying! But is that glimpse or vision the reality, and the fruit of mentalism? Anthony says no, but it is still good and should not be overlooked:

   When you experience the world as a dream you know you are getting closer to its reality. it is not reality yet, but you know you are getting closer. It is an intuitive understanding that dawns - that the mind projects the world, then experiences the world that it projects...when you experience the world as a dream, rather than the way you experience it now, there is an intuitive understanding that arises with it at the same time that you are coming closer to the very nature of the mind. (35)

   This remark, as all remarks, is paradoxical, as there is no "you" to get closer to reality. Any "you" dissolves in reality, and never really existed in the first place! Nevertheless, recognizing the limits of our language, this is somewhat similar in nature, albeit at a lesser degree, to a comment by Ramana on the nature of visions attained through deep concentration:

   God [ie., light] is seen in the mind. The concrete form is seen...it is like a dream-vision. After God is perceived, vichara [enquiry] begins. This ends in realization of the Self. Vichara is the ultimate route. (36)

   Thus seeing the world as a dream is akin to being in the Winess state. Yet there is one more stroke to go, as it were, one more apparent veil to be lifted, before Reality or the non-dual Self dawns.

   Jed McKenna argues that the "cogito ergo sum" of Descartes ("I think, therefore I am,") is the ultimate non-dual inquiry. As he puts it, "a tool that helps us see, without intermediaries, exactly what is true and what isn't" - and that all we can finally know is "I am". This again is what Nisargadatta said. To further stir the pot, I end with words by the incomparable Moody Blues, sages of the sixties, fit to contemplate and close this discussion:

   I think, therefore I am....at least, I think I am.

   Hmmm. Is that pseudo-mentalism, or the real thing?

_______________________________________________________________________________________

For a useful on-line guide to the 'I am' inquiry, also called the "awareness watching awareness" method, click here. For an introduction, click here.

(1) Joe Espositio and Elena Oumano, Good Rockin Tonight (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1994), p. 123
(2) Anthony Damiani, Standing in Your Own Way (Burdett, New York: Larson Publications, 1993), p. 125)
(3) The Notebooks of Paul Brunton (Burdett, New York: Larson Publications, 1988), Vol. 13, Part 3, 2.91, 3.64, 3.66
(4) Anthony Damiani, op.cit., p. 123
(5) Anthony Damiani, Living Wisdom (Burdett, New York: Larson Publications, 1996), p. 64-65
(6) Anthony Damiani, Standing in Your Own Way, op. cit., p. 125-126
(7) The Notebooks of Paul Brunton( Burdett, New York: Larson Publications, 1987),Vol. 6, Part 1, 1.127
(8) The Notebooks of Paul Brunton, op. cit., 1.136
(9) Anthony Damiani, Looking Into Mind (Burdett, New York: Larson Publications, 1990), p. 42
(10) The Notebooks of Paul Brunton, op. cit., 1.158, 1.165
(11) Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth (New York: Dutton, 2005), p. 294
(12) Anthony Damiani, Standing in Your Own Way, op. cit., p. 170
(13) Talks with Ramana Maharshi (Carlsbad, CA: Inner Directions Foundation, 2001), p. 161
(14) Ibid, p. 184
(15) Ibid, p. 101-102
(16) Ibid, p. 254
(17) Ibid, p. 161
(18) Stephen Wingate, The Outrageous Myths About Enlightenment (Atma Publishing, 2006), p. 28-29)
(19) Robert Adams, Silence of the Heart (Santa Barbara, CA: Acropolis Books, 2007), p. 37
(20) The Notebooks of Paul Brunton, op. cit., 4.198
(21) op. cit., Vol. 15, Part One, 1.183
(22) Paul Brunton, Essays on the Quest (York Beach, Maine: Samuel Weiser, 1984), p. 183
(23) The Notebooks of Paul Brunton, op. cit., Vol. 3, Part 1, 2.112 (25) Anthony Damiani, Standing in Your Own Way, op. cit., p. 212
(26) Ibid, p. 208
(27) Ibid, p. 216
(28) Michael Molinos, The Spiritual Guide (Christian Books Publishing House, 1982), p.
(29) Jean-Pierre deCaussade, Abandonment to Divine Providence, Letters(www.ccel.org/ccel/decaussade/abandonment.iv.vii.ix.html) (Christian Ethereal Classics)
(30) Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, I AM THAT (Durham, North carolina: The Acorn Press, 2008), p.
(31) Ibid, p.
(32) Ibid, p. 298
(33) Ibid, p. 347
(34) (Transcribed from a talk in Pacific Grove, CA, June 9, 2006
? 2006 by Adyashanti. www.adyashanti. org)
(35) Anthony Damiani, Looking Into Mind, op. cit., p. 43
(36) Talks with Ramana Maharshi, op. cit., p. 172