Ego - The basis of the World around us

Ego is Life.
Life is Ego.
Beyond the Ego lies the True Self.
Ego depends on Self.
Self is independent of Ego.
Surrendering to God helps in leading an ego-less existence.
Leaving everything to God is not fatalistic. It is realistic.
Realizing that our control is only in action (if at all) and not on the results thereof is a practical approach to life.

Those who cannot comprehend that life (or the world around us) is unreal need only to observe carefully what happens in deep sleep. The Self Exists in deep sleep but the body (or the mind and sense) is not existent. The body is not existent in deep sleep precisely because it is not real and the Self exists precisely because it is real. There is no reason why the body-mind-sense complex would not have continued to exist even in deep sleep - just as the Self does - were it (body-mind-sense) to be real. One can argue that the proof that the body exists even in deep sleep can be found from the testimony of those who were awake while one was asleep. However the fact is that the entity offering the proof (the one who was awake) is as much a part of that unreal world whose existence is being sought to be verified by the questioner. Hence their (the ones who were awake) testimony is as unreliable as anyone else's.

However, all said and done - it's hard to believe there is no body mind sense in reality and that it simply is a projection of the Ego generated by Maya. So long as one continues to believe that the body mind sense is real (meaning it has an independent existence of its own) it's best to have Shraddha (Faith) in what the scriptures declare and continue seeking the Truth till one is undoubtedly convinced of the Original Error - the belief that the world is real.

Sages have very carefully established the parameters for Reality and Non-Reality. It is almost axiomatic that a Real thing continues to be Real always regardless of Space and Time and can NEVER be unreal. In a similar fashion - a Non Real thing can never be real even though it may appear Real in some space-time dimension. The fact that it appears real is no proof of its binding reality. Its unreal all the same. Life is a drama in Unreal space, appearing to be ruthlessly real when it truly is unreal in the strictest sense of the word.

This fact has been thus stated in the Bhagavat Gita Ch II, 16) - नासतो विद्यते भावो नाभावो विद्यते सतः
Existence never belongs to the Unreal, nor does non-existence belong to the real.

That being said, many people question - how are we to lead our lives then. Granting that life and the world is but a figment of imagination, unreal as it were, how are we to conduct the "lives" that we seem to lead all our waking moments? How do we tackle life's problems, relations, jobs, pleasure, pain and such like. Ramana Maharshi used to say that the answer to these problems would become unnecessary once the Truth of our True Selves is discovered. However till such time as the Truth is discovered - one has to have Faith. Logic is helpful for negating things. But establishing a conclusive truth requires more than mere logic. We are so dependent on that very thing (Ego or Ahamkar), which we are seeking to negate, that it seems well-nigh impossible to see the Truth beyond the seeming rigmarole. How can Ego in all its vanity allow its own negation? It will do everything under its control to annihilate any force that seeks to kill it. Hence Life as we see and know it will go on.

Indeed there is a time and place for answers to questions cited in the previous paragraph. They will become irrelevant once knowledge dawns alright. But, another question is - why and how would they become irrelevant when knowledge dawns? And the answers is that the questioner itself would not exist when the knowledge dawns for it is the false association of the questioner with the unreal that has created these questions in the first place. Once that false association is conclusively overruled, there are no more questions. Answering these questions in the wake of true knowledge is akin to trying to find the answer to the question - what is the sex of the baby born to a sterile woman - she cannot conceive and hence there is no question of a baby much less a question of what its sex would be.

Yes it is amazing and preposterous too it may appear to some. How can you deny all that we see around. But somebody had said, Truth is Stranger than Fiction. I cannot agree more. Truth indeed is stranger than Fiction.

Many people also ask - how do sages (or self-realized people) such as Ramana Maharshi see the world then? Since they know it's a false appearance - are they aware of their bodies and the world around them? Because they seem to respond as normal people do and there does not seem to be any difference between them and a 'normal' person. Again, while it's impossible to find the truth of this particular question, the answer is that first you realize who you truly are and then you will know what the sages see. If you don't realize the True Self yourself, your Ego will make appreciating any answer provided to this question meaningless anyway. Whether they see the world is meaningless. The Truth is that there is no world out there except in the imagination of the Ego. So the answer is obvious.

There is another argument advanced to falsify the notion of there being no world around us - namely that all OTHER people too see the same thing as each one of us does. For example when you watch a movie in a cinema hall - obviously, all the people are watching the same scenes being enacted. How do we explain this? While it can be explained - the fundamental thing to be understood is that the basis of all these questions - the primary ego - is the one that's posing these questions in the first place. Since the realm of the Ego itself is in question, everything else associated with it stands falsified a-priori. For instance, a conceived fight between two donkeys with horns on their heads is falsified right from the start simply because a donkey with a horn does not exist to begin with - so there is no question of witnessing a fight between two such donkeys. Similarly, the answer to the Movie Question is that we all continue to see the same thing because the True Self inhering in us all is the SAME. That's the Advaita principle - there are no individuals in reality - there is only one True Self which inheres in the seeming variety we see around us. So it's not surprising that we ALL see the same thing around us.

Questions are many - but the answer is only ONE. The world is false. What we see around us is false. The only thing we can say for sure is that our existence-awareness-consciousness is our true identity. All the rest, we simply OWN - just as we own a house, a car or a medal. They are mere possessions but not US. And even as possessions, they are mere imaginations of the Ego - they appear real because essentially everything (including the Ego) derives from the Supreme Brahman. Call it whatever you will - Universal Spirit, God or Brahman. That's the one abiding reality. Everything else is a mere projection.

So people would say - Oh you mean to say all is Null and Void? That the Science we are so fond of has made no advances? That we have not evolved from Apes to Humans? That we did not create fire by rubbing stones? That we did not create the Taj Mahal? That September 9/11 did not take place? That aeroplanes, rockets, Jupiter, Mars, Venus do not exist? Oh the endless list of questions this point attracts! And then when you answer - the response is - well the easiest way to negate your opponent is to deny his (or her) existence itself. No opponent, No fight. Similarly, Advaita Vedanta too - in one seemingly arbitrary sweep of a magic wand - seems to attack directly at the very existence of all that we see around us - and thus seems guilty of promulgating "an escapism of sorts". True, any "normal" person would see in the foregoing an urge to break free, an urge to run away from the problems surrounding us; indeed there is a fancy term for it - the urge to be in DENIAL MODE. Well, so be it. As I said before - this is not a matter of academic debate. This is Para Vidya - a matter of Direct Experience. Just as one can never be free of one-self twenty-four-seven during our perceived life spans on earth, so too this existence-consciousness-awareness is our real, true identity - that which never fades away no matter what.

I am not a Self-Realized individual, but I stand convinced that what I have read from the scriptures and from the writings of our Sages is the real Truth. This does not mean I have stopped living my life and have abandoned myself to the mountains. I continue doing what I have to. I haven't stopped doing Karma and I continue to experience the full sway of all the three primal qualities of Sattva, Rajas and Tamas. The only way to rationalize what I am doing with what I have said so far is this - so long as I am aware of my body and my existence in this body, I have to continue doing what I have to in order to live. There is no escaping that. However, I do perceive a marked shift in my Attitudes and Values presumably as a direct consequence of what I have learnt from the Scriptures. My desire to make a mark, to win, to defeat opponents etc is slowly losing its hold on me. But until the Truth is fully experienced, Life will go on. I am not denying Life. All I am saying is that it is NOT the TRUTH.

I have something in me which Swami Dayananda ji says - Shraddha Pending Discovery. Since this is a matter of Self-Realization - this is a journey each one has to undertake personally. The universe can only aid us, but the effort has to be our own. There are ways to do this. I will address some of what I know in my next article.