Mandukya Upanishad

I wouldn't say it's one of my favorite books, but it's definitely worth reading.

And On top of that, we have the Mandukya Upanishad Kalaka.

Now you've heard me talk about this book many, many times in the Nididhasana series.

And it's one of my own personal favorite books of all time.

And I would say it's probably one of the greatest books that's been ever written, to be fair.

And so in this one, Nikila Nanda translates it wonderfully.

You've got to remember that the Mandukya Upanishad, this version particularly from the Vedanta society, comes with Gaudapada's Kalika and Shankara's commentary.

So Gaudapada and Shankara are kind of like the founders of Advaita Vedanta, you could say.

When the mind becomes no mind.

Mandukya.

Remember that.

When the mind becomes no mind, that mind becomes Atman.

Because Kaivalya Upanishad is a small Upanishad with 25 mantras.

It is bigger than the Mandukya but there is no Karika or anything.

There is no Shankaracharya's commentary also for that.

But I have created a book

These three states of pure consciousness should be understood as the citta referred to in this sutra.

In the Mandukya Upanishad, the four states or dimensions of consciousness are dealt with in a very lucid form.

If you read this Upanishad or a commentary on it, your personal consciousness will become clear to you.

Well, Editor Edward, could you give us, I don't know, a shortened version of that, unless it's already very short? The Mandukya Upanishad opens by declaring Aum.

Actually, Alan Watts.

Aum.

That Brahman is this self, Atman, consisting of four corners.

Aum as all states of consciousness.

So there can be microsleeps during wake and there can be microwakes during sleep.

And Rinpoche, if this ends up being interesting and something that you want to address, in the Upanishads, the Mandukya, they address waking consciousness and sleep, taking apart the sound of OM.

So the sound AH, Jagrat, excuse me, I may not be pronouncing that properly.

is the um it's considered the interaction of consciousness and the external world so that's our essentially our waking state uh the next state uh dreaming or svapna um is a conscious exploration of internal states uh where we're essentially shut off from external states deep sleep um or um the innermost world with conscious states, an internal state of suspension, or you might say bliss.

What it means is that when you actually apply neti neti, when you strip away the job, the body, the fears, the ego, that pure awareness that remains, it is not separate from ultimate reality.

But how does this map onto our actual daily lived experience? The Mandukya Upanishad connects this cosmic reality to us by mapping human consciousness to the sacred syllable OM.

Waking awareness is the A sound.

Dreaming is the U.

But in fact, what it is, it has always been and always will be.

Sarvam Omkara Eva, Mandukya Upanishad starts with that.

Always was there Om, always will be Om, and now itself, Sarvam Omkara Eva.

It is just.

reality of my own nature.

All those things which we studied in the seventh mantra of Mandukya.

that but the Upanishad or Gita or Krishna

cannot be telling a you know joke or a statement which cannot be true so there has to be a

Yeah, just 60.

I mean, I know Mandukya is only 12 versus this is 60-odd.

But it's kind of a nice kind of pocket-sized thing.

And maybe that is why Swamiji says that we should listen to this first or study this first.

Yeah,

yeah.

Mandukya is like a...

I call it a field of landmines.