Attaining Self-Realisation - Ramana Maharshi's Instructions

The Sushupti Avasta, the Deep Sleep State is natural to every one of us and we experience it on a daily basis. In this natural phenomenon which we all experience every night, the Nature is silently screaming and trying to tell us some important messages and theNature’s silent scream is actually deafening.

From time immemorial, for every single human being, there are some very profound truths the Nature is relentlessly trying to tell through our deep sleep experience, but we have not been paying attention to them. At least now let us try to wake up and find out what those truths are.

After a nice long deep sleep when we wake up, do we feel terrible or do we say the sleep was blissful? We never ask this question. After we wake up, we say, “I had a very nice sleep” and forget about it.

For example, a dessert which may be a pudding or ice-cream, we might enjoy it and feel good. After that, we just forget about it. But if we question ourselves why the dessert felt good, then it gives us knowledge.

Why did the dessert feel good? It felt good because it was sweet.
Where did the sweetness come from? From the sugar which was added to the dessert.

Simple. The entire truth now stands revealed.

In the same way, after we wake up if we question why the sleep felt good, then the message which the Nature is trying to give us would get revealed.

Why did the sleep feel good? The sleep felt good because it was extremely peaceful.
How did we get the peace? It was peaceful because there were absolutely no thoughts.

In deep sleep:

I did not know who owes me or whom I owe.
I did not know about my bank balance or the loan and EMI I have to repay.
I did not know about my profession.
I did not know about the place or the city where I was sleeping.
I did not know about my religion or nationality.
I did not know about my parents, siblings or children.

For that matter in the deep sleep, I did not know whether I am a male or a female.

Though all the reasons given above are true, they are only symptoms and not the real reasons.

The real reason is “I did not have my Ego” in the deep sleep. When the Ego is dropped, all the symptoms discussed so far materialise and finally results in the "experience" of Peaceful Bliss.

When we wake up, we always say, “I slept happily and peacefully”. Peace and Happiness resulted because in the deep sleep the Ego gets automatically dropped.

Thus the message we get from the deep sleep experience is "Whenever the Ego is absent it results in Peace and Happiness".

For now, let the theory be clear which is “to remain in happiness shed the Ego”.

How to deliberately get rid of theEgo while in the waking state, we shall see as we go further. Fortunately it is not an impossible task, thanks to the Advaita Vedanta and the amazing amount of work done by the great Vedic Scholars and provided for the benefit of everyone of us.

See Also:

• Oneness in Deep Sleep


• Jagrat Avastha (Waking State)
• Swapna Avastha (Dream State)
• Sushupti Avastha (Deep Sleep State)


• Traya Avastha (Three States)


• Traya Avastha Viveka