PDA

View Full Version : Is Advaita a non-experience?



astrostudent
29 March 2011, 06:10 AM
Namaste,

Experience implies duality, the experience and the experiencer. And since advaita is nondual, is experience impossible?

But if that's the case, what's this state like?

Peace,
Astro

Eastern Mind
29 March 2011, 07:19 AM
Vannakkam astrostudent: The truth of advaita is beyond words, only to be experienced. I've heard it called 'the great non-experience'. Within the intellect, it sounds confusing. Certainly I nor very few have 'experienced' it. The endless rounds of words are like walking around and around and around a mountain, never going upward. But that's just my take.

Personally, I don't get all the discussion on it. It's there, it's real, but discussion doesn't take us there. Meditation, getting rid of karma, clearing the mind, all do.

Aum Namasivaya

yajvan
29 March 2011, 10:36 AM
hariḥ oṁ
~~~~~~

namasté

The conundrum as I see it.... the mind is groomed for experiences. This implies a subject and an object.
And if we were quite specific we would say it this way... a knower, an object to be known, and the instruments (the senses) to perceive the object.
Yet when we talk of advaita ( not two or non-dual) it is the notion of one unity, continuity of Being from the knower to the object being perceived.
So, the pickle is the mind it looking for something to perceive as ~non-dual~. How can this be if there is a continuum of unity?
The mind would also be part of the continuum.

So we read all this is indeed brahman, then brahman is both named and nameless, form and formless, beginning-less and beginning.
Yet these are mere words. We are told it is na agrāhya - not graspable.
That is, the totality of brahman is not an object of knowledge.

This is the point - this fullness is not an object that appears in duality. If one wishes to say then, I only wish to know the knower -
we again say , how can this occur because it is the knower that is the final perceiver of all.

So then what can one do? One can be this fullness, be this brahman. That is what is talked about. It cannot be grasped because that
would infer and edge, an end, a finite thing, which it is not.

That is why the wise say it is na-iti na-iti (which comes to be known as neti neti) - not this not this. It infers and points us to the notion
it cannot be any-thing. Fullness comes not from adding but by subtracting things away from our experience, until all is removed and
there resides this fullness in full bloom.

praṇām

astrostudent
29 March 2011, 01:34 PM
Thanks.

It's complicated, though. We can look at it this way. There are two levels of knowing, and 'knowing Brahman' would be radically different.

Onkara
29 March 2011, 03:01 PM
Namaste,

Experience implies duality, the experience and the experiencer. And since advaita is nondual, is experience impossible?

But if that's the case, what's this state like?

Peace,
Astro

Wondeful insight, Yajvan.

Namasté Astrostudent
To add a few words. Brahman is already here, now. In Advaita something cannot come from nothing, so what ever is to be found or realised must exist here now. So why does one feel that there is something missing or waiting to be experienced?

As Yajvan points out it is the mind which by its nature seeks and by observation of the nature of the mind we become aware of that which exists beyond experience and time. Some may take up the practice of discrimination (vivek) others may prescribe meditation (dhyāna) and for others it may be through their action that they recognise its nature e.g. bhakti yoga.

So experience continues to be reported (by you) but it is bound by time and known as impermanent and subject to sorrow. Experience has a start and an end. All experience must rise and fall, like a wave, in the foundation of Brahman, the Self. Knowing Brahman to be the permanent foundation there is no place else to go and no experience apart from It (non-dual Brahman).

TheOne
29 March 2011, 03:11 PM
If you say it is a non-experience I would say it is a non-non-experience because non-experience implies duality between existence and non-existence.


See how this could go on forever? Human language is all about abstractions and putting experiences into familiar boxes. People can't describe Advaita accurately to people who haven't experienced it in the same way we can't describe death to an alive person and can't describe colors to a blind person.


Sure we can *try* to describe and trying is very effective but ultimately to matter who much you describe the outside world to a blind person they can only understand it using familiar terms but once their blindness is removed they will forever know what's it like "out there".

Ramakrishna
29 March 2011, 08:25 PM
Namaste Astro,

I reiterate what others have said, that it truly is indescribable. By your line of reasoning, I suppose Advaita is a non-experience, but somebody can make the opposite argument as well. Advaita and moksha cannot be put into words and are ultimately indescribable. You will just have to wait until you get there and then you will see if it's an experience or a non-experience.


If you say it is a non-experience I would say it is a non-non-experience because non-experience implies duality between existence and non-existence.


Good one! :)

Jai Sri Ram

devotee
29 March 2011, 11:02 PM
Namaste Astrostudent,



Experience implies duality, the experience and the experiencer. And since advaita is nondual, is experience impossible?

But if that's the case, what's this state like?


There are various stages of Advaitic expeiences like Sabeej Samadhi (Samadhi with seed) and Nirbeej Samadhi (Seedless Samadhi). Those who have experienced it have described it something like this :

a) Expansion of Consciousness beyond body and mind ... the Consciousness dissolves everything around us including Sun, Stars & the entire cosmos. Finally, there is no "I" left which could differentiate between itself the "other". It is an undescribable "experience" of I-I. This experience is direct experience i.e. without involving the sense organs. The "soul" realises that It alone is all that is around in this universe. This is also the state of One-ness.

b) The state of perfect bliss which again is not describable as it is the direct experience by the spirit of its own blissfulness

There appears to be something beyond these two also as appears from the talk of the Realised Souls but no description is available beyond these above two. Swami Vivekananda used to laugh at the proposition that everything in this universe is Brahman. Once he was making fun of it when Ramkrishna passing through from a distance heard it & aksed all of them to stop and meditate. Just a few days after this event, Swami Vivekananda had the direct experience & he was not able to keep himself in control and cried out in ecstasy ... later he narrated his experience which was akin to what I have stated above. The after-effect of that again lasted for many days & he kept seeing God in each and everything around ... no differentiation.

*************************

The above should be taken only as a hint & not the real thing. It is the finger pointing to the moon & not the moon itself (in words of Wei Wu Wei). In words of Bhagwan Rajneesh (OSHO), it is the taste of sugar experienced by a dumb person.

This discussion is not much useful. Let us proceed in the direction towards Self-realisation. The real taste of mango can only be experienced ... no amount of words can describe it.

OM

anirvan
30 March 2011, 01:27 AM
i will put this in the words of Sri Ramakrishna paramahansa ji,

one salt ball wanted to measure the depth of sea and dived into it.when it reached at the bottom of the sea, found itself that it was completely melted,vanished and nobody is there to measure the depth.

its similar thing. but when the experienced person comes back(which is very very rare as nobody comes back from Nirvikalpa samadhi except few chosen one)....they comes with a totally new chitta(nirman-chitta--patanjali yogasutra) created for the return for those chosen ones with some new samskar for a certain period of time and for a certain purpose.(remember this new chitta is not bound by rule of Karma,hence after death not bound by birth and death).they become satguru.

so they describe that(advita) experience from memory,not the direct experience.but yes they have now habituated with that Nirvikalpa samadhi and now its natural to them when and where they want to go into it.(sahaj samadhi)

but again they can"t describe it directly while in that stage,but only from memory when come back to dual stage.

Jayaguru