The treasure I have found cannot be described in words, the mind cannot conceive of it.
Adi ShankaraRead
As gold purified in a furnace loses its impurities and achieves its own true nature, the mind gets rid of the impurities of the attributes of delusion, attachment and purity through meditation and attains Reality.
Interpretation
Meditation helps cleanse the mind of delusions and attachments, leading to a clearer understanding of reality.
This quote by Adi Shankara uses the metaphor of gold being purified in a furnace to illustrate how meditation can refine the mind. Just as gold emerges free of impurities, through meditation, individuals can remove the negative attributes of delusion and attachment, thus reaching a deeper level of awareness and understanding of Reality.
In practice
During a mindfulness workshop, I shared this quote to emphasize the benefits of meditation.
The treasure I have found cannot be described in words, the mind cannot conceive of it.
Even after the Truth has been realised, there remains that strong, obstinate impression that one is still an ego - the agent and experiencer. This has to be carefully removed by living in a state of constant identification with the supreme non-dual Self. Full Awakening is the eventual ceasing of all the mental impressions of being an ego.
Like the appearance of silver in mother of pearl, the world seems real until the Self, the underlying reality, is realized.
Give up identification with this mass of flesh as well as with what thinks it a mass. Both are intellectual imaginations. Recognise your true self as undifferentiated awareness, unaffected by time, past, present or future, and enter Peace.
But the jiva [living being] is endowed with ego and his knowledge is limited, whereas Ishwar is without ego and is omniscient.
There is sorrow in finitude. The Self is beyond time, space and objects. It is infinite and hence of the nature of absolute happiness.
My folks tried to make a preacher of me and missed by a narrow margin… I would have made a good one if I hadn’t fallen into the fatal folly of reading anything I could lay hands on. With just a touch more self confidence and a liberal helping of ignorance I could have been a famous evangelist.
No wisdom that she may gain by experience and reflection hereafter, will compensate the loss of her present hilarity.
No persons are more frequently wrong, than those who will not admit they are wrong.
True meditation can never be done with the mind. Very often we make a mistake when we say that we are meditating in the mind and utilising the mind. Real meditation is done in the psychic being and in the soul. It goes hand in hand with flaming aspiration, the burning flame that wants to climb up to the Highest.
The object of reflection is invariably the discovery of something satisfying to the mind which was not there at the beginning of the search.
What a sense of security in an old book which Time has criticized for us!
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