Ramana Maharshi On Meditation: Meditate Or Drive Away The Mosquitoes?

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Ramana Maharshi, the great Indian master, offered practical solutions to seekers, who approached him with worldly or spiritual issues. There are several answers to the questions put forward by the seekers to Ramana Maharshi on meditation and the master came up with practical solutions.

Let's explore one such question put forward by a seeker to Bhagavan Ramana regarding mosquito bites, which intruded his meditation.

Meditate or drive the mosquitoes away?

Devaraja Mudaliar in his book 'Day by Day with Bhagavan', recorded an incident wherein a seeker, Krishna Jivarajani asked Ramana Maharshi, "Suppose there is some disturbance during meditation like mosquito bites, should one persist in meditation, and try to bear the bites and ignore the interruption or drive the mosquitoes away and then continue meditation?"

Ramana answered that the seeker should do what is convenient to him, whether to put up with the mosquitos or drive them away when they interrupt his meditation. He further clarified, "You will not attain Mukti simply because you refrain from driving the mosquitoes away. The thing is to attain onepointed-ness and then to continue and then to attain Manonasa," (annihilation of the mind).

Hence, whether one puts up with the mosquitoes or drives them away is left to the individual. The point is to do away with the thoughts. Ramana further pointed out, "If you are completely absorbed in your meditation, you will not know that the mosquitoes are biting you. Till you attain that stage, why should you not drive the mosquitoes away?" (Source: Day By Day with Bhagavan,10.5.1946)

In the Ramana way, to do away with thoughts, one ought to understand that the root of all thoughts, which is the 'I thought' or the ego should be addressed through self enquiry. One should investigate the nature of a thought when it arises by asking, 'For whom is this thought?' The answer will be 'For me'.

One should further investigate, 'Who am I?' in which case the thought will vanish in the source from where it emerged. Each time when thoughts arise, the seeker untiringly will have to question for whom the thoughts are until they disappear. Ramana says, without thoughts there is no entity called the mind. With steadfast practice and the master's grace, the seeker gets established in the thoughtless state. This is manonasa.

Bhagavan Ramana Maharshi thus gave a practical solution for the seeker who was disturbed by mosquito bites yet revealing what true meditation was.