Effort and grace

CONVERSATIONS WITH ANNAMALAI SWAMI

Q: You talk a lot about effort but rarely speak about grace. Don't you attach much importance to grace?

AS: Grace is important; in fact it is essential. It is even more
important than effort. Realization of the Self comes about through both effort and grace. When one makes a steady effort to abide in the Self one receives the Guru's grace in abundance. The grace comes not only through the form of one's Guru. When you meditate earnestly all the jivanmuktas of the past and present respond to your efforts by sending you blessings of light.

Living by the Words of Bhagavan, p. 294.

Krishna's consciousness

Realization

The State we call Realization is simply being oneself, not knowing anything or becoming anything. ~ Sri Ramana.

If one has realized, he is That which alone is, and which alone has always been. He cannot describe that state. He can only be That. (Gems from Bhagavan, VIII).

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CONSCIOUS IMMORTALITY

Q: Is it possible to be conscious without thought?

M: Yes. There is only one Consciousness. In sleep there is no 'I'. The ‘I’-thought arises on waking and then the world appears. Where was this ‘I’ in sleep? Was it there or not? It must have been there, yet not in the way you feel now.

The present is only the 'I'-thought, whereas the sleeping ‘I’ is the real 'I'. That subsists throughout. That is Consciousness. If that is known you will see that it is beyond thoughts. Thoughts can be like other activities, not disturbing the supreme Consciousness.

- p. 99

U r life

Who gave us this crazy idea that we should know how to live? Does a tree know how to grow? Does a cloud know how to float? Does the wind know where it is blowing? Does a road know that it is going somewhere? Don't know how to live, just recognise that you are life, and life just is.

~ Mooji