It So Happened That: The Unique Teaching of Ramesh Balsekar With Stories & Anecdotes

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The daily talks with Ramesh Balsekar used to be an eloquent and delightful happening of the Teachings of pure Advaita (Non-duality). When the ego asked: "How can the intellectual understanding which is a conceptual understanding become the truth for me?" Ramesh would explain: "It can only be known from personal investigation and experience that 'no action is my action'. The teaching can be of use only if it helps you to live your life in peace." Every conversation would be new and fresh, laced with deep insights and abundant humour.

Ramesh, a Master of Advaita, taught for over twenty years, sharing with seekers how a sage lives his life and pointing to Totality with stories and anecdotes from life as it happens. With laughter, Ramesh himself would say: "For those with an interest in the subject, it's the most beneficial entertainment in town."

Ramesh Balsekar always speaks about the same subject, Consciousness, but never in quite the same way. His talks are spontaneous and he welcomes, almost requires, questions from his listeners. (He humorously threatens to read from his extensive collection of written material if no questions are forthcoming. This threat can be quite effective.)

Ramesh's personality has a love for stories, an excellent and encompassing sense of humor, spontaneity, and a sense of comic timing that often has people laughing at their own struggles, and at the nature of the predicament that they are in as seekers. For example, at one seminar after he had given a brief introduction, Ramesh said, "So what is the first question? But before that ... the moment that I said that it reminded me of a joke. A rabbi was besieged with people seeing him from morning until evening so he had no time for himself to read or to contemplate or to meditate. He didn't know what to do, and then it struck him. So he put up a notice on his board: 'One hundred dollars for two questions.' Now, of course, he had plenty of free time during the day. Then one rich man came and be said, 'Rabbi, here is a hundred dollars.