Ramana Maharshi Quotes

Realize thy Simple Self, Embrace thy Original Nature.

To know what that true self is without social pressure is to know your true nature.

The state we call realization is simply being oneself, not knowing anything or becoming anything.

Only when you stop identifying yourself with things that are not you, the possibility of knowing the nature of your existence arises.

The fact is that you are not the body. The Self does not move but the world moves in it. You are only what you are.

Were you somebody different a thousand years ago? Will you be somebody different a thousand years from now? What is this One Self that is forever your own deepest being? Must you believe the lies of time? Must you swallow the insanity that One Spirit does not exist? Can you show me your Original Face, of which there is One and Only One in all the entire World?

I realized that... at the core of who we are, we're these perfect beings - and we're not taught that.

The state of self-realization, as we call it, is not attaining something new or reaching some goal which is far away, but simply being that which you always are and which you always have been.

The wholeness and freedom we seek is our true nature, who we really are.

You are awareness. Awareness is another name for you. Since you are awareness there is no need to attain or cultivate it. All that you have to do is to give up being aware of other things, that is of the not-Self. If one gives up being aware of them then pure awareness alone remains, and that is the Self.

The point is that our true nature is not some ideal that we have to live up to. It's who we are right now, and that's what we can make friends with and celebrate.

Every child is simple, just a clean slate. Then the parents start writing on his slate - what he has to become. Then the teachers, the priests, the leaders - they all go on emphasizing that you have to become somebody; otherwise, you have wasted your life. Just the opposite is the case. You are a being. You need not become anybody else. That is the meaning of simplicity: remaining at ease with one's being, and not going on any track of becoming - which is unending.

Know that you have a center.Know that you belong there.Know that the path to the center takes no effort.

Thou art in the end what thou art. Put on wigs with millions of curls, set thy foot upon ell-high rocks. Thou abidest ever--what thou art.

The original, shimmering self gets buried so deep that most of us end up hardly living out of it at all. Instead we live out all the other selves, which we are constantly putting on and taking off like coats and hats against the world’s weather

Whatever be the means adopted, you must at last return to the Self, so why not abide as the Self here and now?

Realisation is our nature. It is nothing new to be gained. What is new cannot be eternal. Therefore there is no need for doubting if one would lose or gain the Self.

Awakening to who we really are is at the heart of yoga. . . .Yoga offers a path to this underlying field of being, which is the source of creativity, fulfillment, and abundance.

...Blessed is anyone who knows who he or she really is and builds a place to live there.

To know yourself as the Being underneath the thinker, the stillness underneath the mental noise, the love and joy underneath the pain, is freedom, salvation, enlightenment.

Unraveling external selves and coming home to our real identity is the true meaning of soul work.

What's in your soul is in your soul.

That's a song about reaching deep inside yourself where you can completely be who you are.

If there's a common thread to my books, it is that each involves an individual's journey. The individual must stay true to themselves.

It is not the end of the physical body that should worry us. Rather, our concern must be to live while we're alive - to release our inner selves from the spiritual death that comes with living behind a facade designed to conform to external definitions of who and what we are.