What should we strive for
Question
1) If the sense of bliss in the body during meditation is NOT atman-realization, is it something detrimental? When a yogi achieves self-realization and merges into the atman completely (like a sugar cube in a water glass) does he not feel the mind or body, since those don't exist any longer?
It is very, very hard to grasp how the individual identity (body and mind) can be discarded such that an individual identity remains. This must be because manas, the mind, is incapable of grasping the all-pervading reality?
2) When a yogi remains on the earthly plane, he creates an ego so he can engage the mind, buddhi, chittha. During this time, he WILL be aware of bodily pain and illness, no? Ramana Bhagawan was said to feel great pain when thieves struck his thighs.
3) The process of death of the physical body is something the yogi must be aware of yet not afraid of in the least. Why is it the case that when the physical body dies the jiva (consisting of the atman wrapped in ahamkara, mind, ego) vacates this body? When the physical body dies, what will happen to the prana of the astral body?
Answer
1. When one resides in the self as the self, the bliss is continuous. He no longer seeks it, unlike earlier, when the Ego used to. It is not bliss which is detrimental, but being the Ego which seeks it externally, when one himself is bliss.
One does feel the mind and the body even after realization. However, he does not identify with those as the self.
It cannot be grasped. It is to be experienced, through merger of the mind into its source.
2. Yes, it is a temporal Ego, used for communication. However, there is no identification with either the Ego or the body, as one's own. Consciousness can be withdrawn from these at will, just as a man residing in a building does not consider it as a part of himself. He vacates it at will.
3. One need not be aware of any of these things. It is enough if one is always aware of himself as the self, bound by nothing. The snake in the rope will disappear on Sunrise. Why should you worry about an imaginary snake (body, mind etc.)? Be the self and be quiet. It is very simple.
ॐ तत् सत्
(That Supreme being is the absolute truth)