Ramana Maharshi

I loved this reading! I really enjoyed the entire reading, but a few passages stood out to me.

"The kingdom of heaven is within you."

I love that line. I realize that many will disagree with that concept and believe that salvation and wisdom is far away and only sought through Christ, as one example, but I couldn't agree more with that idea and think it's unfortunate that so many fail to see the peace and wisdom that we process within ourselves. One doesn't have to search endlessly for answers from someone or something else. A person would be surprised what they may find if they simply stopped to look inside themselves.


“If the mind is happy, not only the body but the whole world will be happy. So one must find out how to become happy oneself. Wanting to reform the world without discovering one’s true self is like trying to cover the whole world with leather to avoid the pain of walking on stones and thorns. It is much simpler to wear shoes.”

Again, I love how this stresses the importance of knowing oneself. I don't believe that a person can successfully take on the world without first truly knowing oneself. In my opinion, going out in the world without having a clear understanding of the person you are would be like walking on stones and thorns barefoot. I love the metaphor used here. Knowing onself is like wearing shoes.


“Reality is simply the loss of the ego. Destroy the ego by seeking its identity. It will automatically vanish and reality will shine forth by itself. This is the direct method. There is no greater mystery than this, that we keep seeking reality though in fact we are reality. We think that there is something hiding reality and this must be destroyed before reality is gained How ridiculous!”

That is so true. It seems we often are in search for something real or some kind of truth when, in fact, we are reality. We don't need to search for what is blocking us from what is going on. We need to simply look at ourselves and we will see our reality and what is true.