Behind My Hand

19.3.45 You should not mix up the dream and the waking states. Just as you seek corroboration about the waking state experiences from those whom you see in the waking state, you must ask for corroboration about the dream experiences from those whom you saw in the dream state, i.e., when you were in the dream. Then in the dream, those friends or relations whom you saw in the dream would corroborate you. The main point is, are you prepared when awake to affirm the reality of any of your dream experiences? Similarly, one who has awakened into jnana cannot affirm the reality of the waking experience. From his viewpoint, the waking state is dream. ( Ramana Maharshi in Day by Day )

“... the talk drifted to the various schools of thought, one saying there is only reality, others saying there are three eternal entities such as jagat, jiva and Ishwara, or pati, pasu and pasam. In this connection, Bhagavan observed humorously, “It is not at all correct to say that Advaitins or the Shankara school deny the existence of the world or that they call it unreal. On the other hand, it is more real to them than to others. Their world will always exist, whereas the world of the other schools will have origin, growth and decay and as such cannot be real. Only, they say the world as world is not real, but that the world as Brahman is real. All is Brahman, nothing exists but Brahman, and the world as Brahman is real. In this way they claim they give more reality to the world than the other schools do. For example, according to schools which believe in three entities, the jagat is only one-third of the reality whereas according to Advaita, the world as Brahman is reality, the wor...

(a) Existence without beginning or end - eternal. (b) Existence everywhere, endless, infinite. (c) Existence underlying all forms, all changes, all forces, all matter and all spirit. The many change and pass away (phenomena), whereas the One always endures (noumenon). (d) The one displacing the triads, i.e., the knower, the knowledge and the known. The triads are only appearances in time and space, whereas the Reality lies beyond and behind them. They are like a mirage over the Reality. They are the result of delusion. ( Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, from Talk 28 )

When I entered the hall Bhagavan was already answering a question which, I gathered, was to the effect “Is the theory of evolution true?” and Bhagavan said, “The trouble with all of us is that we want to know the past, what we were, and also what we will be in the future. We know nothing about the past or the future. We do know the present and that we exist now. Both yesterday and tomorrow are only with reference to today.Yesterday was called ‘today’ in its time, and tomorrow will be called ‘today’ by us tomorrow. Today is ever present. What is ever present is pure existence. It has no past or future. Why not try and find out the real nature of the present and ever-present existence?” Another visitor asked, “The present is said to be due to past karma. Can we transcend the past karma by our free will now?” Bhagavan: See what the present is, as I told you. Then you will understand what is affected by or has a past or a future and also what is ever-present and always free, unaffecte...

There is no difference between dream and the waking state except that the dream is short and the waking long. Both are the result of the mind. Because the waking state is long, we imagine that it is our real state. But, as a matter of fact, our real state is what is sometimes called turiya or the fourth state which is always as it is and knows nothing of the three avasthas, viz., waking, dream or sleep. Because we call these three avasthas we call the fourth state also turiya avastha. But it is not an avastha, but the real and natural state of the Self. When this is realised, we know it is not a turiya or fourth state, for a fourth state is only relative, but turiyatita, the transcendent state called the fourth state. ( Ramana Maharshi, Day by Day, 5. 1. 46 )

Just what exactly do you mean by consciousness? You are conscious, aware, only through thought. The other animals use thought. The dog, for example, can recognize its owner in a simple manner. They recognize without using language. Humans have added to the structure of thought, making it much more complex. - The Natural State, In the Words of U.G. Krishnamurti pdf, p. 62; Peter Maverick

"Bhagavan is among the most severely intellectual of our sages. And yet he warns us that the idea of the Absolute is only, to use the words of Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, the correlative of the relative. It is still a category of thought, whereas the final realization is the annihilation of the mind and all its categories. How shall that which shines with borrowed light illumine the source of its brightness?  - from K. Subrahmanyam's article, "Bhagavan Ramana the White Radiance of Truth" as it appears in Arunachala's Ramana volume 6, page 252.

.... the culture which most of us have inherited is too extroverted and too aggressively intellectual to permit us to understand within a short time what it all means to be a sadhaka, a practical aspirant for a truth of which in our homes and colleges we were not given an inkling. We are apt, moreover, to bring with us scraps of knowledge gleaned from a wide reading of miracle ridden theology and "occultism", including an endeavour to accommodate the Vedanta inside them. The result is that we return from the Guru (the qualified Teacher) and his Ashram with our doubts still in our heads, uncleared, and our minds, about truth and untruth, still befogged. -S. S. Cohen in " Advaitic Sadhana "  (note:  Cohen was an ashram resident during Ramana Maharshi's lifetime )

407 . This apparent universe has its root in the mind, and never persists after the mind is annihilated. Therefore dissolve the mind by concentrating it in the Supreme Self, which is thy inmost Essence.* —- Vivekacudamani, of SRI SANKARACHARYA Text with English Translation, Notes and an Index, BY SWAMI MADHAVANANDA. (1921) —- * An interesting historic translation of Vivekachudamani which is available for download online.

Ask yourself what are the facts.