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When
the skull was sealed I experienced a brilliant
light, like that of an arc lamp, and an indescribable
joy and coolness filled my being. This light and
joy continued for several hours. During this time
I didn’t move about and I was unconscious of what
was going on around me. You may have seen a light
focused on to a concave mirror. Its light is reflected
with a single beam onto a point. Well, sometime
about midnight all the light, like a concave mirror,
was focussed onto the Heart. Then all the light
drained into the Heart. The Kundalini was completely
sucked into the Heart and the Heart was opened
— that is the seat of Arunachala Ramana.
The
Heart is normally closed, but when it was opened
— I never knew any of these things and never
read any theory. These are all practical experiences
— a flood of nectar gushed forth and drenched
every pore of my skin, drenched my whole physical
system. It poured out, went on coming out in a
great flood. The whole Universe was filled with
that Nectar.
The
wonder of it was that my awareness was not in
the body — my awareness was over the whole
of the space filled with that Nectar. The whole
Universe was Nectar. I call it Nectar; you could
call it Ether, something very subtle, attached
with awareness at every point. And everything
living and non-living was like snow flakes floating
in that ocean of Nectar.
If
you ask me what my body was, my body was the whole
universe of Nectar, attached to awareness at every
point. No particular association from the one
body from where it started — this body was
like every other body.
By
morning everything subsided, though the underlying
experience remained. I was totally unconscious
of my body. I was moving around like an automaton,
unaware of my body. In that state I returned to
Madurai where I was a physics professor.
This
was during a Christmas vacation. For the next
two weeks I remained in that state. With the opening
of college I was scheduled to give lectures and
my relatives became rather concerned, for my behaviour
had changed considerably.
I
then returned to Ramanasramam with the intention
of returning to my regular mundane condition —
I do not know what urged me to do this.
I
went and sat before the Maharshi in the Old Hall.
He gave no acknowledgement of my plight and sat,
seemingly, unconcerned.
After
a long time I said to myself, "Well, the son (Maharshi)
seems indifferent to me. Let me go and seek refuge
in my mother, Alagammal." I came and sat in the
Mother’s samadhi room. It was then only a thatched
room. I picked up the book Jnana Vashistha
and began reading it from beginning to end with
the hope of finding the solution to my dilemma.
I continued reading without eating the whole day.
In the evening the answer came: a stanza in Jnana
Vashistha said, "Between two thoughts there
is an interval of no thought. That interval is
the Self, the Atman. It is pure Awareness only."
In
those days I was repeating the mantra ‘Ram,
Ram’. So I said to myself: "Ram —
that is one thought; and Ram again —
that is another thought. But in the interval between
these two thoughts there is silence. That Silence
is the Self." And so, I came to the conclusion
that if I go on repeating ‘Ram, Ram’ it
will resolve itself into that Silence.
I
was very happy. I rushed home and found I was
my normal mundane self, teaching my classes in
the usual way. But all the time, even while the
lectures were going on, ‘Ram, Ram, Ram’
went on repeating in my Heart. For nine years
it went on like that and then stopped of its own
accord. It ended in Silence.
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