When Nisargadatta, a cigarette seller, heard at the age of 35 that a guru was coming to his area and was interested in spiritual teachings, he thought he would finally go along and see what all the fuss was about. After seeing the Guru and putting into practice what he told him, he quickly realized his higher Self and without any study of the scriptures he went on to write a bestseller and a spiritual classic. I am that.
“The profound yet simple words of this extraordinary teacher are intended to awaken us to our original nature. Like the Zen masters of old, Nisargadatta’s style is abrupt, provocative and enormously profound; he gets to the heart of the matter and wastes little effort on unimportant matters. His succinct yet powerful statements are known for their ability to induce shifts in consciousness just by hearing or even reading them.”
He had no formal education, but was respected and loved for his insights into the heart of human pain and the extraordinary clarity of his direct discourse. Hundreds of diverse seekers traveled around the world and visited him in his modest home to listen to him. To all of them he gave the hope that:
“Beyond real experience is not the mind, but the self, the light in which everything appears… the consciousness in which everything happens.”
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, as he became known, had a profound influence on thousands of people who taught from his modest home in India. His style was an honest and open dialogue with sincere spiritual seekers. His main method was self-examination, in which he urged people to search within themselves alone for the absolute reality of consciousness. People started recording the discussions and his book ‘I Am That’ was born.
“I have read literally thousands of pages of books related to consciousness expansion and Eastern spirituality. But after reading Nisargadatta’s Maharaj, something in me has completely changed. I can never think about things the same way.”
He never established a large ashram or following, which he could easily have done if he was looking for ego gratification. He was just being himself and giving himself naturally to those around him.
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj did not put forward any ideology or religion, but gently unfolded the mystery of the self. His message is simple, direct and yet sublime.
Here is how Sri Nisargadatta realized his true self
When I met my Guru, he said to me:
‘You are not who you think you are. Discover what you are. Pay attention to the feeling ‘I am’, find your true Self. Return to that state of pure being, where the ‘I am’ is still in its purity before it became contaminated with ‘I am this’ or ‘I am that’. Your burden is false self-identifications – leave them all behind.”
My guru also told me:
“Believe me, I tell you: you are divine. Consider it the absolute truth. Your joy is divine, your suffering is also divine. Everything comes from God. Always remember it. You are God, only your will is done.”
I obeyed him because I trusted him. I did what he told me.
I spent all my free time looking at myself in silence.
And what a difference it made, and how quickly!
My teacher told me to hold on to the feeling of ‘I am’ and not to deviate from it for a moment.
My Guru told me to pay attention to the feeling ‘I am’ and not to pay attention to anything else. I simply obeyed. I have not taken any specific courses in breathing, meditation, or scripture study.
Whatever happened, I would turn my attention away and stay with the feeling of ‘I am’, it may seem too simple, even crude.
My only reason for doing it was because my guru told me to. Yet it worked! Obedience is a powerful solvent for all desires and fears.
I did my best to follow his advice and in a relatively short time I realized within myself the truth of his teachings.
All I did was constantly remember his teaching, his face and his words. This put an end to the spirit; in the silence of the mind I saw myself as I am – untethered.
I simply followed (my teacher’s) instruction which was to concentrate the mind on the pure being ‘I am’, and to remain there.
I sat together for hours, with nothing but the ‘I am’ in my head, and soon peace, joy and a deep all-encompassing love became my normal state.
In it everything disappeared: myself, my guru, the life I lived, the world around me.
All that was left was peace and an unfathomable silence.