Feeling prime factor, not reason
Mrs. Piggott: Why do you take milk, but not eggs?
M.: The domesticated cows yield more milk than necessary for their calves and they find it a pleasure to be relieved of the milk.
M.: But the hen cannot contain the eggs?
M.: But there are potential lives in them.
D.: Thoughts cease suddenly, then ‘I-I’ rises up as suddenly and continues. It is only in the feeling and not in the intellect. Can it be right?
M.: It is certainly right. Thoughts must cease and reason disappear for ‘I-I’ to rise up and be felt. Feeling is the prime factor and not reason.
D.: Moreover it is not in the head but in the right side of the chest.
M.: It ought to be so. Because the Heart is there.
D.: When I see outside it disappears. What is to be done?
M.: It must be held tight.
D.: If one is active with such remembrance, will the actions be always right?
M.: They ought to be. However, such a person is not concerned with the right or wrong of his actions. Such a person’s actions are God’s and therefore they must be right.
D.: Why then the restrictions of food given for such?
M.: Your present experience is due to the influence of the atmosphere you are in. Can you have it outside this atmosphere? The experience is spasmodic. Until it becomes permanent practice is necessary. Restrictions of food are aids for such experience to be repeated. After one gets established in truth the restrictions drop away naturally. Moreover, food influences the mind and it must be kept pure.
The lady told a disciple later: “I feel the vibrations from him more intensely and I am able to reach the ‘I’ centre more readily than before.”
Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi
4th February, 1935
Talk 24.
