The Mind Turned Inward Is the Self — How Can It Also Be Destroyed? | Michael James

Added: 2026-05-25

[00:00:00]Uh I have read that Ramana Maharishi says that the mind turned inward is the self. In other places he says we need to destroy the mind. Could you please clarify this?

[00:00:11]>> Right. Okay. Very nice question. Um yes in a couple of places David Raja Mudlia has recorded in day by day where Bhagavan said where someone asks Bhagavan a question something to effect.

[00:00:23]What's the difference between the mind and the self? Here the self refers to atmaasupa what we actually are. So what's the difference between the mind and the self? Bhagavan said there's no difference. The same mind when turned outwards is called mind or ego. When turned inwards towards the self it is the self. What he means by that is there is only one eye. This one eye when it rises identifying itself with a body it looks outward. It attends to things other than itself. But this eye is nothing different from the pure eye. The pure eye is what is called Brahman. So one of the things a very famous um uh saying of Adi Shankra Bhagan also used to quote Brahman Satyam Brahman alone is real jag the world is mita mitya means it's it's just it's unreal jamehap the ja is nothing other than Brahman alone So this ja is the ego.

[00:01:40]Brahman is what we actually are. They're not two different eyes. They're one in the same eye. The difference between well there there is no difference there but the the seeming difference and bang had made it very clear in um in upeshundia. He expressed it very clearly in verses 24 and 25.

[00:02:03]What he says in verse 24 is what that means is by their being nature God and soul Isa and Ja are just one pal one substance.

[00:02:25]So essentially they're the same. And what is that one substance? That's what he calls the being nature. So in their being, they're one and the same. So our being and God's being, it's the same being.

[00:02:41]It's they're not two two different things. What makes us seem different is what he refers to as upu.

[00:02:51]Means what we identify ourself as. So now um we we're aware of ourself. The person who asked this question is Anand.

[00:03:00]If we're aware of ourel as I am Anand, Anand is a name of a person.

[00:03:06]That person consists of five she's a body uh life, mind, intellect and will.

[00:03:14]These five make up this person called Anand or the person called Michael or the person called Tiru or the person called Chandra Shake. Any person is made up of five sheav.

[00:03:25]These five sheav are not what we actually are. But there is an eye that is identifies itself and is aware of itself as I am this person. This bundle of five sheav that I is ego.

[00:03:40]The the person we take ourselves to be the five she the body is is the is the new. It's a false identification.

[00:03:52]Up is often translated as um adjunct or a limiting adjunct. But um it it's there's no one word in English. I mean adjunct is quite a good word, but it doesn't fully capture the sense of updadi means a disguise, a false identification, something masquerading as something else. So um what we take ourselves to be that is the upd.

[00:04:22]We who take oursel to be that that is ego. But that ego is a ego as Bhagavan often explained it is chit jada granti chit means awareness. That's a pure awareness. That's what we actually are.

[00:04:39]Juda means what is not aware. That is the upadi. This these bundle of five sheets. They're all juda. They're not they have no awareness of their own. Why the p why people seem to be aware it's not the person who's aware it's the I that is aware of itself as I am this person who is aware and so the person seems to be aware that I is ego so that I is a mixture of that pure awareness and the set of adjuncts which are jada so chit granti means it's a not but seemingly binds chit and jada of course chit is never actually bound. Jit is ever free. But uh in the experience of our self as ego are we seem to have been limited to this set of adjuncts.

[00:05:31]So um I'm just trying to remember what the question was again. Oh yeah. So this this same eye when when we rise as ego we grasp the form of a body as ourself and we consequently become aware of so many other forms. So our attention is constantly turned outwards. It this same eye that is now attending to all these external phenomena. These very vam this vish external phenomena. This same eye if it turns its attention back within to see who am I to see itself it will subside and merge back into its being and it will remain as being. That being is that being is such it that is what we actually are.

[00:06:24]So, but we seem to be something else so long as we're looking away from oursel.

[00:06:28]When we turn our attention back towards ourself, we see we're nothing but such.

[00:06:34]That is, has anyone ever seen ego?

[00:06:38]When we look within to find out who is this I who who is aware of itself as I am Michael or I am Tu or I am Anand or whatever that I we don't we don't see a separate that I is a separate thing that I to the extent to which we m we attend to it it subsides back into its underlying being.

[00:07:07]So what is called the self in other words Brahman or atma sorupa what we actually are that is the being eye the um the ego is the rising eye it rises identifying itself with a set of adjuncts so long as it's looking outwards it seems to be this set of adjuncts but when it looks within to see what it actually is it finds nothing but the pure your being eye which is Brahman.

[00:07:39]So that's why Ban said the same mind when looking outwards is called mind when looking inwards is called the self except Ban didn't use the word the self because that's an English term the term he would have used that is swarupa that's what we actually are swarupa means literally means own form our own form that means ourself as we actually are so not two eyes. It's just that the the eye mixed with mixed and conflated with adjun is always looking outwards. If that same eye looks within, it merges back into its being and it remains at that being.

[00:08:27]And by merging back into the being, thereby the mind is destroyed because there truly speaking there's no such thing as mind at all. We seem to mind and in this context mind and ego are synonymous. Bavan says in verse 17 of India um if when one investigates the the form of the mind without uh forgetting there's no such thing as mind at all.

[00:09:03]What that means is the form of the mind there means what the mind essentially is is just this eye that is now aware of itself as I am this person. I am this body. If we attend to that eye, not to the what it identifies with, but to the eye as mere awareness, we will find that there's no um that the the adjunlated eye doesn't exist at all.

[00:09:29]Only the pure eye remains.

[00:09:32]So that is what is called the destruction of the mind. By seeing what we actually are, we will see that no such thing as mind ever existed.

[00:09:43]And a simple analogy for this, if you if you're walking on a path in in the dim light of dusk and you see something on the path, you're afraid because you think it's a snake. Banan said, "No, it tells you, no, it's not a snake. Look at it carefully and see. You look at it carefully and see. Oh, it's just a rope.

[00:10:05]What has happened to the snake?

[00:10:08]Has the snake been Has the snake run away? Has it been killed? No.

[00:10:13]Metaphorically, we can say the snake has been killed. But truly speaking, there never was a snake there at all. by seeing what it actually is, the the superimposed illusion that um that it's a snake is removed. Likewise, when we see what we actually are, the the superimposed delusion called ego is removed forever.

[00:10:40]So seeing ourself as we actually are is the destruction of the mind.

[00:10:46]And in order to see oursel as we actually are, we need to turn within to see what we actually are. So it's it's it's um these two statements they they are in they they are perfectly aligned. They they they are pointing to the same thing.