Nisargadatta Maharaj - Quotes about 'Presence' - from the book 'I AM THAT'

The Living Present

The Ever-Present


There is something exceptional, unique, about the present moment, 
which the previous, or the coming do not have. 
There is a livingness about it, an actuality;  it stands out as if illumined. 
There is the 'stamp of reality' on the actual,
which the past and future do not have.

What makes the present so different? 
Obviously, my presence.  I am real  for I am always now, in the present, 
and what is with me now shares in my reality. 
The past is in memory, the future - in imagination. 
There is nothing in the present event itself that makes it stand out as real. 
It may be some simple, periodical occurrence, like the striking of the clock. 
In spite of our knowing that the successive strokes are identical, 
the present stroke is quite different from the previous one and the next 
- as remembered, or expected. 
A thing focused in the now is with me, for I am ever present; 
it is my own reality that I impart to the present event.

You need not say it is some unknown factor 
that gives reality to the present, for you see it in constant operation.
Since you were born, has it ever changed? 
Things and thoughts have been changing all the time. 
But the feeling that what is now is real has never changed, even in dream.

--------

The Absolute, to the mind, is just a theory.
In Itself, it is the reality.  
It is reality in its spontaneous and total rejection of the false. 
Just as light destroys darkness by its very presence, 
so does the Absolute destroy imagination. 
To see that all knowledge is a form of ignorance 
is itself a movement of reality. 

The witness is not a person.  The person comes into being 
when there is a basis for it, an organism, a body. 
In it the Absolute is reflected as awareness.
Pure awareness becomes self-awareness. 
When there is a self, self-awareness is the witness. 
When there is no self to witness, there is no witnessing either. 
It is all very simple;  it is the presence of the person that complicates. 
See that there is no such thing as a permanently separate person 
and all becomes clear.

------

There is no darkness in the midst of light. 
Self-forgetfulness is the darkness. 
When we are absorbed in other things, in the not-Self, 
we forget the Self.  
There is nothing unnatural about it. But, 
why forget the Self through excess of attachment? 
Wisdom lies in never forgetting the Self as the ever-present source 
of both the experiencer and his experience.

------

The Absolute is not an object to be recognized and stored in memory. 
It is in the present  and in feeling rather. 
It has more to do with the 'how' rather than with the 'what'. 
It is in the quality, in the value;
being the source of everything, it is in everything.

The Absolute It gives birth to consciousness.  
All else is in consciousness.

The objective universe is in constant movement, 
projecting and dissolving innumerable forms. 
Whenever a form is [infused with life], 
consciousness appears by reflection of awareness in matter.

------

Realize the full import of the only true statement you can make: 'I am'.
How is it done?  There is no 'how' here.  
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.

------

Were you not present at your birth? 
Will you not be present at your death? 
Find what is always present.

------

In the present, in the Now, 
you are both the movable and the immovable. 
So far you took yourself to be the movable 
and overlooked the immovable. 
Turn your mind inside out.  Overlook the movable and
you will find yourself to be the ever-present, changeless reality, 
inexpressible, but solid like a rock.
You may hold on to the idea that you are not aware of it.
Let go the idea.

------

How does personality come into being? 
By memory. By identifying the present with the past 
and projecting it into the future. 
Think of yourself as presence itself, without past and future 
and your personality dissolves.

At present your Being is mixed up with experiencing. 
All you need is to unravel Being from the tangle of experiences.
Once you have known pure Being, without being this or that, 
you will discern it among experiences 
and you will no longer be misled by names and forms.


Whenever you have a spare moment, look within.
What is important is not to miss the opportunity when it presents itself. 
If you are earnest you will use your spare time fully.  That is enough.

------

When the mind is kept away from its preoccupations, 
it becomes quiet.  If you do not disturb this quiet and stay in it, 
you find that it is permeated with a light and a love you have never known; 
and yet you recognize it at once as your own nature.
Once you have passed through this experience, 
you will never be the same man again; 
the unruly mind may break its peace and obliterate its vision; 
but it is bound to return, provided the effort is sustained; 
until the day when all bonds are broken, 
delusions and attachments end 
and life becomes supremely concentrated in the present.


Reality is what makes the present so vital, 
so different from the past and future, which are merely mental. 
If you need time to achieve something, it must be false. 
The real is always with you;  you need not wait to be what you are.


The witness is merely a point in awareness.  
It has no name and form. 
It is like the reflection of the sun in a drop of dew. 
The drop of dew has name and form, 
but the little point of light is caused by the sun. 
The clearness and smoothness of the drop
is a necessary condition  but not sufficient by itself. 
Similarly, clarity and silence of the mind are necessary 
for the reflection of reality to appear in the mind, 
but by themselves they are not sufficient. There 
must be reality beyond it.  
Because reality is timelessly present, 
the stress is on the necessary conditions.


Your real nature is not like what you appear to be. 
Give up the idea of being a person, that is all.
You need not become what you already are anyhow. 
There is the identity of what you are 
and there is the person superimposed on it.
All you know is the person, but
the true identity which is not a person you do not know, 
for you never doubted, never asked yourself 
the crucial question - 'Who am I'. 
The identity is the witness of the person 
and sadhana consists in shifting the emphasis
from the superficial and changeful person 
to the immutable and ever-present witness.

------

Try to be, only to be.  The all-important word is 'try'. 
Allot enough time daily for sitting quietly and trying, just trying, 
to go beyond the personality, with its addictions and obsessions.
Don't ask how, it cannot be explained.  You just keep on trying
until you succeed.  If you persevere, there can be no failure.
What matters supremely is sincerity, earnestness; 
you must really have had surfeit of being the person you are, 
and now see the urgent need of being free of this unnecessary 
self-identificationwith a bundle of memories and habits. 
This steady resistance against the unnecessary is the secret of success.
After all, you are what you are  every moment of your life, 
But you are never conscious of it, 
except, maybe, at the point at awakening from sleep. 
All you need is to be aware of being, 
not as a verbal statement, but as an ever-present fact. 
The awareness that you are  will open your eyes to what you are. 
It is all very simple.  First of all, establish a constant contact 
with your self, be with yourself all the time. 
Into self-awareness all blessings flow. 
Begin as a center of observation, deliberate cognizance, 
and grow into a center of love in action. 
'I am' is a tiny seed which will grow into a mighty tree 
- quite naturally, without a trace of effort.


*******************************

    The Nisarga Yoga, the 'natural' Yoga of Maharaj, is discon-
certingly simple - the mind, which is all-becoming, must recog-
nize and penetrate its own being, not as being this or that, here or
there, then or now, but just timeless being.
    This timeless being is the source of both life and conscious-
ness. In terms of time, space and causation it is all-powerful,
being the causeless cause; all-pervading, eternal, in the sense of
being beginningless, endless and ever-present. Uncaused, it is
free; all-pervading, it knows; undivided, it is happy. It lives, it
loves, and it has endless fun, shaping and re-shaping the uni-
verse. Every man has it, every man is it, but not all know them-
selves as they are, and therefore identify themselves with the
name and shape of their bodies and the contents of their cons-
ciosness.
    To rectify this misunderstanding of one's reality, the only way is
to take full cognizance of the ways of one's mind and to turn it into
an instrument of self-discovery.
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