Definition - Ananda Wood
Further to the last three weekly definitions on 'sat', 'chit' and 'Ananda', here is a piece of verse attempting to summarize them as three aspects of one truth.
'sat' or 'existence'
The world is nothing else but truth.
That is its plain reality.
Each lie that's told shows falsity,
producing thus a seeming show
of what does not in truth exist.
This seeming show is partly true,
but it is also partly false.
What's truly shown is here confused
with false appearances that seem
to hide what they more clearly show.
What then is that reality
which may be found, when falsity
is questioned and thus clarified?
The falsity that's questioned here
is of our bodies and our minds.
For it is through these instruments
that we perceive and think and feel.
It is these instruments which act
to show us the appearances
that they produce, through all of their
perceiving and conceiving acts
towards their objects in the world.
And it's by questioning these acts
that we may come to clarity:
about what's true and real here,
in the appearances of world
which we perceive and think and feel
through all our personalities.
But to what truth may we thus come,
through this reflective questioning?
Just what reality is it
that we may thereby realize?
This questioning reflects within,
to a reality of self
that's found in every one of us.
There, truth is found that shows itself,
without the need for any act
which gets put on or taken off.
That truth of self is found direct,
by merely being what it is.
It is just that reality
whose truth is unmistakable.
In that reality of self,
truth is exactly that which has
no falsity mixed into it.
'chit' or 'consciousness'
Whatever world may be perceived,
or thought about or felt conceived,
in anyone's experience,
this world is shown by seeming acts
of partial body, sense and mind.
Each act creates a seeming show
that's known by light of consciousness.
That light is knowing in itself.
Its very being is to know.
It knows itself without an act,
by merely being what it is.
There, consciousness knows just itself,
as its own true identity.
What's called a 'knower' thus turns out
to be identical with what
may also be described as 'known'.
These are two different ways in which
we speak of an identity
where nothing alien intervenes
between what knows and what is known.
That is true knowledge: known direct,
by coming back to what one is,
to knowing in identity.
That consciousness which knows itself
is shown by all appearances
that are perceived or thought or felt
in anyone's experience.
Thus, each perception, thought or feeling
shows what we call 'consciousness'
and what we call 'reality'.
Both of these words refer to what
is always shown in common -- by
all differing appearances
which are perceived and thought and felt
by different persons in the world.
But that which is thus shown in common
cannot be two different things.
For if it were, it would be shown
in common by this seeming two;
and that would make it one alone.
That one alone is spoken of
as 'consciousness' when thought turns back
to look for it as that which knows.
And that same one is said to be
'reality', when looking out
beneath the show of differences
that are perceived and thought and felt
by different persons in the world.
Two words thus point to what is one.
It is at once the self that knows
and all the world's reality.
'Ananda' or 'happiness'
When knowing self and what is known
are thought by mind to be at odds,
there comes a state where mind appears
conflicted and dissatisfied.
This is a restless state of mind,
believing that it is in want,
for lack of something it desires.
This state is called 'unhappiness'.
But when desire is fulfilled,
the mind then comes to happiness
in which its conflicts get dissolved.
That happiness is not a state
which comes and goes in changing mind.
It is instead what motivates
the mind's achievement of desire.
As mind seeks objects, all this search
is for the sake of happiness.
It's in the end for happiness
that any object is desired.
That final goal of happiness
is shared in common by all minds.
It stays unchanged: throughout all change
of mental states, in search of all
the different objects sought thereby.
When a desire is achieved,
the mind is brought to happiness --
found at the centre of each heart --
where change and difference don't apply.
All imperfection there dissolves:
in that perfection for whose sake
all life is lived, all acts are done,
and all these happenings take place
in world and personality.
Addendum -
Dhyanasaraswati
From Ribhu Gita – (Sri Ramana was very fond of quoting from this famous text )
Your True Nature is always the undivided , non-dual Brahman !
Which is a mass of Being-Consciousness-Bliss (Sat Chit Ananda)
Motionless , Ancient , still Eternal,
Without Attributes. without Confusion , without Sheaths
Without parts and without impurity
Completely free from any illusion of Duality
Full , Peerless and the ONE !
Return to the Contents page for the Terms and Definition.
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