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No being, no existence is closer to us than the self -- so ignorance must first be attached and defeated at this point. One who is ignorant about his own self cannot attain knowledge on any other level.
The flame of knowledge first begins to burn in man's inner being. It is the east of knowledge and the sun of knowledge rises there. If there is darkness there you can be certain there cannot be light anywhere else. Know yourself, not God. This ray of light will ultimately grow into the sun. It is by knowing one's self that one realizes that there is sat-chit-anand, that there is being, consciousness and bliss, but that there is no "I", no ego. That very realization is the realization of God.
Man is a soul shrouded by an ego. And this is ignorance. A soul that is rid of the ego is God. And this is knowledge. Where are you going in search of your soul? In any of ten directions it is nowhere to be found. But there is one more direction, an eleventh. Do you know it? I will show you this direction.
You yourself are that eleventh direction and you can find this direction if you stop looking in the other ten. The eleventh direction is not like the other ten. In reality it is not a direction at all. It is no-direction, the negation of direction. It takes you where you have never left. It is your own entity, your own natural state. All of the ten directions go outward. The world is their creation. The ten directions are the world. They are the distance. But the one that knows all of these directions and moves in them is certainly separate from them, certainly different from them -- otherwise he could neither know them nor move amongst them. He moves and at the same time does not move. If he is not firmly established in his own being he is unable to move, because at the center of all his movement there is motionlessness, because at the center of his revolving wheel there is fixedness. Have you ever noticed the wheels of a carriage? The wheels are only able to move because the axle is stationary. There is always a fixed thing holding and sustaining any movement. Life is unstable and transitory but the soul is permanent and stable. The soul is the eleventh
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