All happiness comes from awareness. The more we are conscious the deeper the joy. Acceptance of pain, non-resistance, courage and endurance - these open deep and perennial sources of real happiness, true bliss.
The search for Reality is the most dangerous of all undertakings, for it destroys the world in which you live.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote suggests that seeking true reality can be a perilous endeavor as it may lead to the collapse of one's perceived world.
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj warns that the pursuit of true Reality can be a transformative yet risky journey. As individuals delve deeper into the nature of existence, their established beliefs and understanding of the world may be fundamentally challenged or dismantled, resulting in existential upheaval. This process can lead to profound realizations, but it can also cause confusion and disorientation as one grapples with the stark contrasts between perceived reality and ultimate truth.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about existentialism at a philosophy club, one might reference this quote.
More from Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
All quotes βEven faith in God is only a stage on the way. Ultimately you abandon all, for you come to something so simple that there are no words to express it.
Forgetting your Self is the greatest injury; all the calamities flow from it. Take care of the most important, the lesser will take care of itself. You do not tidy up a dark room. You open the windows first. Letting in the light makes everything easy. So, let us wait with improving others until we see ourselves as we are/ and have changed. There is no need to turn round and round in endless questioning; find yourself and everything will fall into its proper place.
Watch your thoughts as you watch the street traffic. People come and go; you register without response. It may not be easy in the beginning, but with some practice you will find that your mind can function on many levels at the same time and you can be aware of them all.
Learn to live without self concern. _x000D_ _x000D_ For this you must know your own true being as indomitable, fearless and ever victorious. _x000D_ _x000D_ Once you know with absolute certainty that nothing can trouble you but your own imagination, _x000D_ _x000D_ you come to disregard your desires and fears, concepts and ideas, and live by truth alone.
Do not neglect this body. This is the house of God; take care of it, only in this body can God be realized.
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Now as of old the gods give men all good things, excepting only those that are baneful and injurious and useless. These, now as of old, are not gifts of the gods: men stumble into them themselves because of their own blindness and folly.
I cannot see how a man of any large degree of humorous perception can ever be religious -- unless he purposely shut the eyes of his mind & keep them shut by force.
She mixes religion with desertion to make it sound noble.
Gradually I came to realize that the process of saving the desert of the human heart and revegetating the actual desert is actually the same thing.