Atman is not reflected consciousness nor unconsciousness.
Brahman is imperceptible, unrelatable, and indescribable.
Turiyam is that intuitive unborn I-essence, like Ayam Atma Brahma.
Wednesday, October 15, 2025
RJ11: thunderous utterances
Sages say I am that silver screen upon which this movie is playing.
They say this movie has no beginning. Only truth reveals its end.
Naturally such revelations first appeared in the highest Himalayas.
They call those first four thunderous utterances the Mahavakyas.
A forest of Upanishads would grow around their divine light.
Prajnanam Brahma. Tat Tvam Asi. Ayam Atma Brahma. Aham Brahma Asmi.
Reality Jingles 10: walls
Within this fortress of spacetime, reality feels like a rock hard wall.
That's not reality though. That's me slamming into the limits of duality.
Reality transcends spacetime as the sky contains and pervades the clouds.
Reality is that spaceless awareness and timeless existence seeing through my so-called walls.
Sunday, October 12, 2025
RJ9: Aum
To auspiciousness of being, the principle of existence, and presence of nonduality.
To the ground of consciousness, self-awareness, and raw intelligence.
To this holistic bliss infinity that I am.
Aum
RJ8: free the intellect
Intellect is a reflection of unanalyzed raw intelligence
as mind is a reflection of unfiltered pure consciousness.
Self-awareness frees the intellect while deconstructing egoic mind.
Reality Jingles 7: adhyaropa and apavada
The metaphysics of nonduality aren't completely logical. Duality is logical. Nonduality transcends logic. Sooner or later comes a zen slap.
Maya is the power of God, Isvara, Saguna Brahman, Brahman with attributes. All attributes are Maya. Nirguna Brahman is without attributes.
They call this adhyaropa and apavada (superimposition and refutation). Universal metaphysics are so rendered only to be stripped away.
Reality Jingles 6: not self-realization
The metaphysics of nonduality is
not self-realization of course,
but it's an important way to deconstruct
the western scientific materialism metaparadigm,
and that's saying a lot.
Reality Jingles 5: the presence of nonduality
Yes, the Self is not like deep sleep. Although deep sleep is the absence of duality, it's not the presence of nonduality.
Both dualities (the waking and sleeping dream states) and the absence of duality are pervaded by that presence of nonduality.
This permeation of all three states of reflected consciousness is like the air pervading the mists of Maya. See, there's nothing but Turiya.
Friday, October 10, 2025
Reality Jingles 4: my God
The manifestation of Atman shall be my God while lucidly dreaming.
The highest nondual truth revealed in the principal Upanishads is that voice of God, Aum.
Aum is Brahma and Aum is Parabrahman. Aum is changeless. Aum.
Reality Jingles 3: that nondual presence
Consciousness is the substrate. Reflected consciousness is the superimposition.
The brain is a subtle body reflecting consciousness. The mind is reflection of consciousness.
Attention is consciousness plus thought. Most think this is pure consciousness but it's not.
Pure consciousness is that nondual presence witnessing duality and deep sleep.
Reality Jingles
1. a superimposition on reality
Both the universal and the individual are limited consciousness-existence.
Whether your god is God, atheism, agnosticism, or quantum mechanics, it's but a superimposition on reality.
Pure consciousness pervades the universe like a mountain lake permeating numerous reflections.
2. that's samsara
This universal god is omniscient and super-intelligent. Reality is knowledge and intelligence oneself.
Human beings are divided units of universal consciousness which is paradoxical for God is indivisible.
That's samsara for you.
Monday, October 6, 2025
The Great Awakening (AG11.1,2,6,7,8)
In the name of Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva, and the Power of Three, Isvara and Maya are my first twofer.
This body-mind is the fate of DNA and social conditioning. That Pure Consciousness is the witness and I Am That.
God the universal consciousness and me, individual consciousness, go together like Saguna Brahman and avidya.
The world is a mass hallucination. All beliefs, be they theistic, nationalistic, or scientific, are lesser mass hallucinations.
The Great Awakening will be homeless, without boundaries, and all alone. In the meantime, love.
Transcreating Ashtavakra 11.1,2,6,7,8: kaivalyam-iva
Transformation, conservation, and all ruination is the very nature of this phenomenal universe: the one who completely understands this fact is invariably constant, worry-free, and becalmed.
Isvara is the maker and the material and there's nothing other than that here: the one who completely understands this fact is desireless, serene, detached.
I am not the body nor is the body mine for I am Pure Awareness: the one who completely understands this fact no longer is concerned with what one does or doesn't do, but is completely at one with oneself.
I am in everything from Brahma the Creator to a blade of grass: the one who completely understands this fact is free from all vicissitudes of thought, withdrawn from what is finished or not finished, and in complete atonement.
This manifestly wondrous universe is unreal: the one who completely understands this fact is without any dwelling, absolutely open, and placid as if nothing else existed.
Friday, October 3, 2025
That Himalayan Bordertown
Abandon all ignorance ye who exit here. It's that Himalayan bordertown, Jake. There are two states of sleep: deep and dreaming. There are two states of dreaming: subtle and phenomenal.
Subtle dreaming is called the dreaming state. Phenomenal dreaming is called the waking state. What one wants is phenomenal experience. What one needs is Brahmavidya.
Desire isn't dirty in and of itself. Desire for reality is an immaterial one. Consciousness-existence is the fire. Firewood is the body-mind. Brahmavidya knows avidya isn't vidya.
~talking AG10.1-5
Transcreating Ashtavakra 10.1-5: what else could you desire?
Desire is your greatest opposition. Wealth brings great misfortune. Good deeds cause both. Abandon all of it. It's none of your business.
See it like a dream within a days-long sleep: companions, property, capital, residence, significant other, and all which you prize.
Wherever there's desire, there's the world. Take refuge in detachment. Be happy.
Our captivity consists of desire. Our freedom rests in its deconstruction. Detaching from the world attains perennial joy.
You are that one pure consciousness. This phenomenal universe is a lifeless illusion. Your ignorance of that is also illusion. What else could you desire to know?
Thursday, October 2, 2025
Wednesday, October 1, 2025
Ode to Gaudapada
Atman is neither seed nor god, sprout nor sunshine, in-between nor nothing at all.
Brahman is nonconceptual and nameless, non-dimensional and formless, causeless and sublime.
Gaudapada says Turiyam is that I transcending every state I am. Ayam Atma Brahma.
Tuesday, September 30, 2025
Project Mandukya 2025 Afterword: Two Gaudapadas and a Buddhist Elephant
Having finished Project Mandukya 2025, I am writing this afterword. First let's talk about the Buddhist elephant in the room. There's at least two Gaudapadas in the room as well.
The first one is a G establishing Vedantic credentials by wrapping oneself in the flag of sacred revelation with a little Upanishad they like to call Mandukya.
The second one explains the first one's three-part Vedantic karika, using Buddhist language almost exclusively. Whether either G was an ex-Buddhist convert or an old-time Vedantist
using the Mahayana language of that age's spiritual empire is not a relevant question. Both G's are Vedantic in a revolutionary way. In the high Himalayan caves, G is known to be a great wise fool.
And Shankara is Saint Paul to that Laughing Jesus. Are there 2 G's or just a younger one and older one? Either way, all individual dharmas are unborn.
Short Talks on MK4.99-100
The knowledge of a realized one is untouched and pure.
The suchness of all being is that knowledge.
This is not the understanding of the Buddha.
Beyond all grasp, depthless, unborn,
unvarying and fearless is that realization.
I bow to that with all my power.
Monday, September 29, 2025
Translations & Commentaries MK4.96-100
96. ajeṣvajam-asaṅkrāntaṁ dharmeṣu jñānam-iṣyate, Yato na kramate jñānam-asaṅgaṁ tena kīrtitam. ~G
अजेषु – in the birthless; अजम् – unborn; असंक्रान्तम् – unrelated; धर्मेषु – separate entities (souls); ज्ञानम् – pure Consciousness; इष्यते – is traditionally held, admitted; यतः – since; न क्रमते – does not relate to any other object, in other words, unconditioned; ज्ञानम् – this knowledge; असङ्गम् – not related; तेन – with that; कीर्तितम् – proclaimed ~trC
96. Pure Consciousness, the essence of the separate entities (jīvas) is admitted to be Itself unborn and unrelated to any of the external objects. This Knowledge is proclaimed to be unconditioned as It is not in anyway related to any other objects. ~trC
Knowledge, which is the very essence of the unborn jivas, is itself called unborn and unrelated. This Knowledge is proclaimed to be unattached, since it is unrelated [to any other object]. ~trN
It was the labour of the Kārikā to prove to us that the external world of objects is a mere delusory projection of the mind. In terms of this projection, the scientific world or the world of ordinary transactions, we understand by the term 'knowledge' only the conditioned awareness. When I am aware of a thing, I declare my knowledge of it. The possibility of the Knowledge Absolute by Itself, is not generally understood or experienced by the average man because of his incapacity to get himself completely detached from his own mental projections of the objectified world. ~C
From the standpoint of Reality the jiva is identical with Knowledge, as the sun is identical with its heat and light. This refutes the theory of the realists, such as the followers of the Nydya doctrine, that knowledge is an attribute of Atman and arises only through the contact of the mind with an external object. The fact that Knowledge, or Consciousness, is not absent in the absence of an outer object is known from the study of deep sleep and the oneness realized in the deepest contemplation. It has already been stated that the appearance of external objects is due to maya. ~N
97. aṇumātre‘pi vaidharmye jāyamāne‘vipaścitaḥ, asaṅgatā sadā nāsti kimutāvaraṇa-cyutiḥ. ~G
अपि अणुमात्रे – even slightest idea; वैधर्म्ये – of plurality (origination of any object, different from Brahman); जायमाने – entertained; अविपश्चितः – by the ignorant; असङ्गता – non-attachment, unconditioned; सदा – forever; न-अस्ति – there can be no; किम्-उत – where then is (means there is no); आवरण – veil; च्युतिः – the end of (destruction) ~trC
97. The slightest idea of plurality in Ᾱtman entertained by the ignorant, walls them off from their approach to the unconditioned; where then is the destruction of the veil covering the real nature of the Ᾱtman? ~trC
97. To those ignorant people who believe that Atman can deviate from Its true nature even in the slightest measure, Its eternally unrelated character is lost. [In that case] the destruction of the veil is out of the. question. ~trN
alabdhāvaraṇāḥ sarve dharmāḥ prakṛti-nirmalāḥ, Ᾱdau buddās-tathā muktā budhyanta iti nāyakāḥ. ~G
(98) अलब्धा – free from; आवरणाः – veil or bondange of ignorance; सर्वे – all; धर्माः – souls, jīvas; प्रकृति – by nature; निर्मलाः – pure; आदौ – from the very beginning; बुद्धाः – ever illumined; तथा – and; मुक्ता – liberated; बुध्यन्त – capable to know; इति – that; नायकाः – wise men, Masters ~trC
98. All jīvas are ever free from bondage and pure by nature. They are ever illumined and liberated from the very beginning. Still the wise speak of the individuals as ‘capable of knowing’ the Selfhood. ~trC
98 All jivas are ever free from bondage and pure by nature. They are illumined and free from the very beginning. Yet the wise speak of the jivas as capable of knowing [Ultimate Reality]. ~trN
The position described in the text is most difficult to grasp, since the average man, firmly believing in causality, accepts the veiling or bondage of Atman as a fact. But from the standpoint of Atman there is no causality and therefore no veil or ignorance. The idea that the veil can be removed by Knowledge is itself the result of avidya. ~N
99. kramate na hi buddhasya jñānaṁ dharmeşu tāyinah, sarve dharmās-tathā jñānam naitad-buddhena bhāṣitam. ~G
न क्रमते does not ever touch; बुद्धस्य of the realised one; ज्ञानम् - the Knowledge; धर्मेषु हि – any object at all; तायिनः who is all-wisdom; सर्वे धर्माः all the entities (jīvas); तथा similarly; एतत् ज्ञानम् -this knowledge; बुद्धेन - by Buddha; न भाषितम् - is not the view of ~trC
99. The knowledge of the realised one who is all-wisdom is ever untouched by objects. Similarly, all the entities as well as knowledge are also ever untouched by any object, 'this is not the view of the Buddha'. ~trC
99 The Knowledge of the wise man, who is all light, is never related to any object. All the jivas, as well as Knowledge, are ever unrelated. to objects. This is not the view of Buddha. ~trN
Buddhist philosophy is nearest to Advaita Vedanta in its dialectics. But the doctrine of Ultimate: Reality as the non-dual Atman, characterized by the absence of distinction of the knower, the known, and knowledge, is taught in Vedanta alone. // The last sentence of the text carries the implication that Gaudapada’s. Karika, even during his lifetime, was suspected by some critics of being. influenced by Buddha’s teachings. The same view is held even now by some of Gaudapada’s critics. But by his emphatic denial Gaudapada puts all such criticism to rest. ~N
Any student of comparative philosophy who has studied with detachment and sincerity both the philosophies must come to the conclusion that Buddha never taught that Absolute was the final Reality though such a teaching verging on the Advaita concept of an absolute Brahman or Ātman, is ascribed to him by different Mahāyāna schools of Buddhism. ~C
100. durdarśam-ati-gambhiram-ajam sāmyam viśāradam, buddhvā padam-anānātvam namas-kurmo yathā-balam. ~G
दुर्दर्शम् - difficult to grasp; अति extremely; गम्भीरम् -profound; अजम् unborn; साम्यम् - uniform, ever the same; विशारदम् - pure, holy; बुद्ध्वा - having realised; पदम् - the state of (the supreme Reality); अनानात्वम् free from plurality; नमः कुर्मः we salute; यथा according to; बलम् our capacity ~trC
100. Having realised that state of supreme Reality which is extremely difficult to be grasped in its profound nature - unborn, ever the same, pure (all-knowledge) and free from plurality we salute it as best as we can. ~trC
Salutation implies duality. It is impossible for a nondualist to salute another entity, because no such separate entity exists. But this salutation is made from the relative standpoint. The commentator, full of human Feeling, is grateful to the Knowledge which has enabled him to attain the Supreme Reality. He drags both himself and Knowledge, as it were, to the relative plane, imagines Knowledge to be the teacher and himself the pupil, and then salutes It. ~N
Legend:
C: Chinmayananda
G: Gaudapada
Gm: Gambhirananda
N: Nikhilananda
P: Paramarthananda
S: Shankara
S/G: Sandeepany / Gurubhaktananda
Sw: Swartz
tr: translated by
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