Ashtavakra Gita 1.4 - Teachings on Self-Realization and Liberation

First, Aṣṭāvakra Maharshi pointed that Janaka is the witness, never the witnessed. The world, nay every object in it including one’s body, is but an ‘object’, the witnessed. Its witness is different. And every one of us is such a witness, the world of objects being the witnessed.

Witnessed cannot be the witness. Nor can the witness be the witnessed. There cannot be any question, doubt or debate in the matter. It is like the subject and object in a sentence, or even in our life and interaction.

We live and move in the world. We interact with the world objects. In the process, we are the interacting ‘Subject’, and the whole world and objects are interacted with. Unless the two, the interacting oneself (the Subject) and the interacted with others (the objects), are distinct from each other, interaction cannot be.

You cannot see yourself. One can see only another. You are always the seer ‘I’, and not the seen other. The seen is an ‘object’ to you. You are its ‘Subject’. Without this basic distinction, no seeing or likewise interaction can ever transpire at all.

This is what the Sage told King Janaka first. “You are the sākshī, witness, of the world consisting of the pañca-bhūtas.” Imagine what should then be the measure of the subject ‘I’! If this much is clear, what next?

Aṣṭāvakra is quite emphatic and conclusive about it. His exhortation is even more focussed. Well heeded, it will take you to the witness pedestal, the ‘Subject’ abode. What should the seeker do for it?

Get into the mind. Sit in a place. Close your eyes. Begin your introspection. Separate your body from you, the sentience animating it. Body is material, but you, the ‘I’ in it, is ‘sentience’ itself, Consciousness. Understand the difference.

Get over the body-idea about you. It is very simple. If you are not the body, the ‘object’, but sentience, its ‘Subject’, then feel and be the sentience alone. It is only the witness of everything else, including the body.

Once the idea is settled, then make your mind and intelligence rest in sentience. Body itself is an idea, the sentience creates. You do not have any body. Mind alone produces the idea ‘I have a body’. In deep sleep, everything including the body is lost, suspended. Is the body verily there then? In the three states of yours, only in jāgrat, wakefulness, the body and bodily actions prevail. In sleep and dream occurring within sleep, the wakeful body has no currency at all.

What is the difficulty in feeling then that ‘I am not the body, but its experiencer and witness alone’? Focus on this essentialness. Learn to abide in it. Be unshaken. You see fire blazing. Do the eyes or mind get burnt thereby? You reflect the body in your mind, you see and activate the body. Does it mean you become the body?

Mind you, life and experiences are purely inner, in the mind. In the mind level, there is no body. Only Consciousness is there, any time, while thinking, generating emotion or reason, enquiry and finding. Consciousness does all these functions notionally, not otherwise. Discern this fact, this truth, remain unshaken in it.

Does or can any object, big or small, enter within the body, into the mind, any time at all? If gross objects cannot enter within the body, to touch and be in the mind, then what are the gross objects in reality? Are they not mind-created ideas and notions alone? Yes, your body is notional, the world too is notional, birth and death are notional. Life too is notional. By pronouncing this fact, can anything happen to them?

Only your own false ideas about the world, its existence and prevalence, undergo the necessary correction, updating. That will make your life and interaction facile, smooth, light and relaxational. You will be able to live and move in the world with poise and contentment, unshaken by its vagaries.

Think of the sun you see every day. Do you ever glimpse the sun verily? It is 149.5 million km away. What you see is its refracted image. That too, an imprint the mind makes in itself, not outside. Can there be any solidity, grossness or externality within your body then, in the mind? Every object perceived is notional. All are notional floats in the Consciousness within.

So, can you not separate the body grossness from you, the sentient presence within? Sit firmly on your own sentientness, Consciousness. Never lose, dilute or destabilize it any time the least.

Being the sole witness and that alone, how can the manifold witnessed world cause any blemish, change or damage to you? Let this understanding shine stronger than the sun and fire, than lightning even. You alone are there within, nothing else can penetrate there. World, if at all, remains in its own place. Be you what you are, the inner Spirit, the Singular Subject Witness Consciousness. Where and when will you have a different fate or plight?

Dismiss all your delusion and illusion. Be enlightened for ever. Float in transparency, freedom and ecstasy the enlightenment radiates and delivers interminably.

This is all a course, process and journey within your body, in sentience, through knowledge, doing the knowing process. Knowledge is an outcome from the knowing process, set afoot by the Knower. There is a still pre-Knower entity, the pure Consciousness, which becomes the thinker, to begin the thinking process and arrive at the outcome called ‘thought’. But, despite all this difference and transition, they are in substance and content just one, only one – the Consciousness, which has its inscrutable power to cause, un-cause and make any change in the caused any time.
Train yourself in this inner, Subject, witness plane. That is why meditation becomes a must. Delve within yourself, unearth all these facts. Let them become your knowledge, finding and realization. That will give the whole process credence, your own testimony.

Discern the inner Consciousness, sentience. Dwell in it well. Now itself, be happy, comfortable and delightful. Do not have any inhibition at all in the matter.