Ashtavakra Gita 18.33 -

Truthful introspection, tattva-vichara, is extremely important and supremely effective, for, it is by introspection that the intelligence gets awakened. Effect of the awakening is instilled into the mind. Well done, these bring about all the reformation, refinement and enrichment the seeker needs to gain full spiritual enlightenment.

The practice of samadhi and adhering to disciplines are solely to take the seeker to the Self. The valid question is whether Self is to be reached at by any effort. Or, the seeker has to understand and realize the Self as what it is. Self is singular, omnipresent. There being no second to it, all thought, doubt and talk about purification, restraint and the like are totally irrelevant.

Can ants crawl in blazing fire? What the seeker needs to do is to realize by intense tattva-vichara, the Self as it is, its nature and glory. Does the Self any time become impure, stained? Can it ever be obstructed? In any condition or state, including health and ill-health, is not the ‘I’ in you, safe and stable, witnessing every state? Can ‘I’ awareness be hindered for any reason? ‘I’ alone feels and reports unconsciousness on being awake.

Sage Ashtavakra repeatedly insists that the only object of spiritual sādhanā is to know the Self and be it. The process is one of knowing and knowledge. Intelligence clinches the issue. What the intelligence knows, the mind imbibes and displays.