A guest post from a younger Freddie

Yesterday while searching Google for articles about Ramana I stumbled across something I wrote about Shiva Rudra Bala Yogi almost twenty years ago. I have no memory of it. I apparently posted it to the “Ramana Maharshi mail list” (whatever that was) and somebody at indiadivine.org preserved a copy. Here it is.

July 7, 2005

Hi Alakeshwar, I’m sorry that I’ve taken so long to reply to your message.

I logged on to the balayogi’s [Shiva Ruda Bala Yogi’s] official site. He advocates meditation technique which wasn’t much favoured by Ramana for some reason. Concentrating between the eyebrows was a technique he seems to have discouraged. On the other hand Paramanahamsayoganananda was all for it.

Funny,isn’t it? I avoided meeting Shivarudrabalayogi for several years because of this. My love for Sri Ramana was and is so tremendous, my trust in his advice in the various books is so great, that I distrusted yoga completely.

Several years ago two good friends of mine who know me well began to tell me that I should meet Shivarudrabalayogi. They had some intuition or hunch that I would be drawn to him magnetically. They urged me to interview him over the phone for the website that I was publishing at that time [realization.org which I’m still publishing 19 years later]. Partly to appease my friends I conducted the interview but never got around to transcribing or publishing it. This was in 2001 or 2002. I spoke to Shivarudrabalayogi for about ninety minutes.

Here is a very funny thing. The phone call convinced me that he was in the same state as Sri Ramana. In the ways that really matter he had had the same experiences — the long periods of nirvikalpa [I misunderstood Ramana about this], the permanent extinction of the mind, the present state of ongoing samadhi — this man described these things to me from the inside. And I could just tell somehow that he was a jnani, even though I had never met one before. He was not like the rest of us. His mind didn’t function in the same way. It seemed quite obvious to me. Volition and distraction just weren’t there. I could feel myself talking to him in a way that’s different from the way I normally talk to people because automatically, on an involuntary unconscious level, my mind reacted to what he is.

And yet I finished the phone call with absolutely no interest in meeting him. Why? Because he had arrived at this state by practicing yoga [I now see that the word “yoga” is misleading], by deliberately concentrating his attention on something other than the I-thought [I now see this is partly wrong]. This turned me off because Sri Ramana disparaged yoga, and Sri Ramana was my lodestone.

Looking back I have to laugh at myself. Which is more important? The fact that someone is in Sri Ramana’s state, or the fact that he arrived at Sri Ramana’s state in a way that Sri Ramana didn’t recommend?

Sri Ramana famously said (the remark is quoted in Talks but I believe he said it frequently, and that it’s quoted in numerous places) that yoga is like beating a bull with a stick to make it go home, but enquiry is like coaxing it with a handful of sweet grass. In this analogy, the bull is the mind and home is the Self. When I spoke to Shivarudrabalayogi in that first conversation several years ago, I recited this remark to him and asked his opinion. Before I tell you his answer I should say that earlier in this same conversation, Shivarudrabalyogi had told me that when he was a boy, when he went out into the world to look for a human guru, he had consciously searched for “a guru of the same caliber as Ramana Maharshi.” Also during this interview he had revealed that he was knowledgeable about Sri Ramana’s written works and some of the books about him.

Anyway, Shivarudrabalayogi’s answer about the bull was something to the effect (I forget his exact words) that there really isn’t any difference. More recently he told me that when you look at the spot between the eyes, you are really looking at the Self.

Something else as well. Sri Ramana often said that deliberate effort can only take you so far. Well, think about it. If deliberate effort only goes so far, and then something else takes over (in other words, you find yourself in samadhi, which is where real enquiry beings), then what difference does the method make? Not very much. The method brings you to samadhi. After that, the thing takes care of itself.

I have continued to press Shivarudrabalayogi again and again on Sri Ramana’s remarks because of my lingering distrust of yoga. I keep wanting him to convince me that yoga is as good as enquiry.

By the way I am not practicing yoga. I am still practicing enquiry. Shivarudrabalayogi knows this and hasn’t given the slightest sign that he cares. “If you want to do it that way,” he said to me one day, “then don’t forget…” and he gave me some advice. He urged me to remember what he called the second half of Ramana Maharshi’s method. He said that everyone remembers to hold the I-thought (actually I doubt that everyone remembers this, but that’s my own opinion). However, he continued, people forget the second part of the advice, which is to see from where the I-thought comes.

Last month I had the extraordinary good fortune to spend several weeks in close proximity to Shivarudrabalayogi. I even had the chance to spend three hours with him alone in a car (it’s an interesting experience to try to remember to drive defensively with a jnani next to you on the seat). The impact of simply being with someone like this is incredible. It’s really mind boggling. It’s not mind boggling because of his “teachings.” His spoken advice, the words that can be written down on paper, are of secondary importance. The thing that matters is the way you feel simply by being near him.

No, “feel” is the wrong word. Your mind is affected by being with him. It doesn’t matter what he says or recommends. In other words, the real teaching is silence. And if the real teaching is silence, then who cares what the jnani says about yoga or enquiry? These things don’t matter that much.

I apologize for the great length of this message. I also apologize for writing on this mail list [i.e. on the Ramana Maharshi mail list where this message was originally posted] about a “person” who is not Ramana Maharshi.

In case I offended anyone, I want to emphasize that I love Ramana Maharshi as much as you do. He has been as big a factor in my life as the life of anyone here. You may not believe me, but it’s true. If Ramana Maharshi is the only person who will ever live who was in Ramana Maharshi’s state, then realization is not something we can ever achieve, and there is no reason for us to seek it or care about it.

But if it’s possible for other people to be in that state, then shouldn’t we want to find such people and be with them? What greater fruit could arise from your love of Ramana Maharshi, than to be motivated by that love to find a human guru who is in the same state as Ramana Maharshi? This isn’t betrayal or disrespect for Ramana Maharshi. It’s an understanding that jnana is not a person. Not any person. Not even the remarkably great person we call Sri Ramana Maharshi. I wish for everyone the same good fortune that has come to me.