The Awakening of the Wave

ओम् श्रीगुरुभ्यो नमः

There was once a wave in the mighty Indian Ocean. Ramu was his name. Being a small wave in the vast ocean was not easy for Ramu. He was often buffeted around by strong winds and other much bigger waves. There were ups and downs in his life. Moreover, he was also saddened by the prospect of his own mortality. He had seen other waves disappear when they hit the shore and he was afraid that it might happen to him too one day.

Days passed by as Ramu continued to survive in the rough seas. There was some thrill when he was riding high but his laughter was laced with sorrow, for he know that soon there would be tears when he was dumped low by forces beyond his control. Such was life as a wave. He was hoping to find some meaning in this kind of turbulent existence.

One day, Ramu happened to meet another wave, they called Him the Guru wave, who exuded a level of contentment and peace he hadn’t seen before. There was clearly something different about this Guru wave. He was not like the other waves he was generally accustomed to meeting. The other waves seemed to share and also reinforce all the same concerns, complaints, and anxieties that he himself had as a wave. But this Guru wave he had just met seemed to be quite happy and at peace with himself, he didn’t seem to have any complaints in spite of being buffeted around like the other waves.

Ramu was a bit intrigued. He was curious to know what made the Guru wave tick. So Ramu respectfully approached the Guru wave.

Ramu: (Prostrating) My Namaskārams to you. My name is Ramu. I came to know of you from my friends. May I ask you about something that has been bothering me?

Guruː (Smiling) Yes, I am happy to discuss anything with you.

Ramuː Sir, life is difficult. These strong winds and other bigger waves push me around a lot. This wave life is like riding a big roller coaster. I feel the highs but I also hit the lows. I have been observing you for some time. I see that you also go through similar ups and downs but then unlike others, you seem to be quite unaffected. That makes me think that you might be able to help me with my emotional upheavals. Please help me!

Guru: (Smiling) I was very much like you when I was young. But then the winds of Karma brought me to my Guru who taught me something extraordinary and wonderful. Something that all waves should know, but almost everyone misses out on. The knowledge that he taught me brought an end to all of my miseries.

Ramu: (Excited) Wow! That is great. I too would like to know what you know! Can you please teach me what that is?

Guru: Yes, I can. The key is this. You need to know who you really are.

Ramu: Who I really am? I know I am Ramu, a rather small wave in the mighty Indian Ocean. I was born on 14th June 2023 near the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. I am about 8 feet wide and about 2 feet high. I am moving in the north-western direction. I dread the day when I will hit the east coast of India because I will perish then. This is likely to be my biography. I have talked to all my friends about this and they too share similar concerns with me.

Guru: (Laughs). Ha Ha! That is what I used to think as well. But when I met my Guru and he taught me Wave Vedanta, I then came to know that I had made a mistake all along.

Ramu: Wave Vedanta? That name somehow sounds familiar. I recall having heard another wave mention that once in the passing, but I wasn’t paying much attention either. I was perhaps too busy pursuing other things then.

But, I don’t think I have made a mistake. I am Ramu, a wave. Just as you are a wave, the Guru wave.

Guru: (Smiles). I know exactly where you are coming from. You just called me a wave. No doubt, that is how you see me and that’s alright. But then once I understood Wave Vedanta as taught by my Guru, I came to know that I am not really the wave I had taken myself to be all along!

Ramu: What?! You are not a wave? Can you elaborate?

Guru: Yes. Wave Vedanta is the primordial teaching passed down from one Guru wave to another in the Wave Guru Paramparā, all great Master Waves who understood and lived this liberating teaching. It is the teaching that reveals who you really are. If you really understand what Wave Vedanta is talking about, you are liberated from the miseries of wave life.

तरति शोकम् आत्मवित् ।

The one who knows his real nature transcends all sorrow.

Chāndogya Upaniṣad 7.1.3

Ramuː (Excited) Sounds like exactly what I have been looking for! Please go on….

Guru: Here is the problem. Who told you that you are just a wave?

Ramu: (Thinks a bit) No one told me so explicitly…I just assumed so because it looks so obvious…my family told me that I was born on such and such a date etc. They are all waves as well. No one needs to tell me that I am a wave. It is quite clear to me that I am one.

Guru: Ignorance only breeds ignorance. Ignorance has a way of perpetuating itself just like a place remains dark until light is brought in. Your conclusion that you are a puny wave in this mighty ocean is an uninvestigated conclusion that you have just assumed and taken for granted. अविचारितसिद्धम् । It is established only due to a lack of inquiry. An ignorant conclusion thrives until it has been inquired into. You have been living in the dark. You need to let in some light for light alone can dispel the darkness.

Ramu: Hmmmm….I am still puzzled.

Guru: Ignorance is invariably followed by a mistake and then actions follow based on the mistake. See the sequence:

Ignorance –> Mistake –> Actions based on the Mistake

Due to ignorance of the sand, one sees water instead. A thirsty person then runs towards a mirage thinking it is water. Due to ignorance of the rope, a person mistakes a rope for a snake and runs away from the snake.

Ignorance not only hides what is really there, but it also projects what is not there. This is called superimposition or adhyāsa. Nonapprehension of reality leads to misapprehension of reality. Not knowing the rope as a rope leads to inevitably mistaking it for something else, a snake. All action that follows based on such superimposition, like running away from the snake, or running towards the mirage, is baseless, rooted in ignorance, and nothing but an amplification of ignorance.

Guru: When we are born, we are ignorant of two things: we are ignorant of the world and then we are ignorant of ourselves. As one studies, one learns more about the world and drops world ignorance bit by bit. However, as the Self is never studied, one continues to remain ignorant of who/what one is.

So it is not at all surprising that you have mistaken yourself to be a wave for you have not really enquired into and known who you really are. You taking yourself to be a wave is a mistake arising out of your Self Ignorance. It is a superimposition upon your Real Self as you have not known yourself as you are. Exactly like a snake is superimposed on the rope that has not been seen as it is.

Ramu: Very interesting….Pray tell me who I am then?

Guru: You, the Wave, are the Ocean!

Ramu: The Ocean!? What? How? I am so small. The ocean is so large. I am at the mercy of the other waves. The ocean is the master, the ruler of all waves! I am just one of the countless waves that have arisen from the Ocean. How can I be the ocean?

Guru: This is the great equation of Wave Vedanta. The Mahāvākya. Tat Tvam Asi. You are That (Whole).

Ramuː Hmmm…..this needs more elaboration.

Guruː I will explain. This Mahāvākya is the great equation that equates the individual and the whole. It equates the puny Wave to the great Ocean. It is the crux of the teaching. An equation is required only when the two sides seemingly look different, but are really one. For example, 1 = 1 is not an interesting equation, it is not giving me any additional knowledge that I don’t already have. However, in the equation, 9 – 1 = 7 + 1, or E = mc², the two sides look different but there is still an identity between the two sides. So also, in the two sides of the equation, YOU THE WAVE = THE OCEAN, the two sides look different, but there is an identity.

Ramu: I don’t see the identity. In fact, I only see enormous differences. Can you explain further?

Guru: Yes. You are a small wave. The ocean is infinitely large. Clearly, both are very very different. However, because the Mahāvākya equates them, there is an identity as well. The thing to note is that the difference is only in the name and form and not the content.

Ramu: Name and form? Content? I don’t understand.

Guru: Take the example of Gold and ornaments. There is a small nose ring. There is a large necklace. Both are made of Gold. There is a difference, no doubt, between the nose ring and the necklace. There is a difference in name, form and function. However, if you look into what they really are, they are both Gold only.

Ramu: I can see that…

Guru: When the nose ring is melted, you get Gold, When the necklace is melted, you again get Gold. If you go to sell either of them, the really smart businessman that the goldsmith is, he pays you based on the price and weight of the Gold ignoring the name and form.

The nose ring after being melted may be shaped into an earring. The necklace after being melted may then be shaped into a bangle. But they still remain Gold no matter how their name, form, or function changes.

Moreover, any ornament, be it the nosering, earring, necklace, or bangle, has no independent existence apart from Gold. When you touch any of them, you are touching Gold. When you weigh any of them, you are again weighing Gold. There is no such thing called nose-ring that really exists! Nose-ring is only a word, which is the name of a form of Gold. What exists is Gold alone!

So you see, Gold is a more enduring reality than a nose-ring, earring, necklace, or bangle. It is not untrue to call the ornaments by their names such as nose-ring, earring, etc. but then it is truer to call them Gold as that is the more enduring truth that doesn’t change with changes in names and forms! Only That which endures all changes can be said to be Real!

So also, you are a wave. And you see the vast ocean. But both are names and forms. The content is really Water! What exists is Water alone! So Water is the common underlying reality behind You, the individual wave, and also behind the totality, the Great Ocean! Both Wave and Ocean are nothing but names given to forms of Water.

Ramu: Hmm….need to think more about this.

Guru: You may have seen dramas where the same actor plays two roles. In one scene, the actor appears as a beggar. And in the following scene, the same actor appears as a king! The actor is the same. Only his name, form and role changed. And in movies, the same actor can appear in the same shot in two different roles.

So also, you are really Water. You yourself are playing the role of a Wave. You alone are also playing the role of the Ocean as well. You are the created Creature. You are also the Creator! In fact, you alone are. You, the only One have, as though, become Many. All this interaction between one wave and another, or between the wave and the ocean is all a play! It is not the reality. The Reality is Water alone, which is none other than YOU!

मनसैवेदमाप्तव्यम् नेह नानास्ति किञ्चन ।

मृत्यो: स मृत्युं गच्छति य इह नानेव पश्ययति ॥

This has to be attained through the mind alone. There is no plurality at all here. One who sees plurality here, as it were, goes from death to death.

Kaṭhopaniṣad 2.1.11

Ramu: Mind Boggling!

Guru: Yes. Once you really understand this, what is there to complain about? As Water, YOU ALONE ARE! A wave may be raised high or dumped low, but as Water, you cannot be raised high nor dumped low for you, the Water, are everywhere. As Water, you are unaffected by whatever happens to the wave or whatever happens in the ocean. Whether it is a calm day, or a stormy day, whether waves are tossed about, whether the ocean is still or in a state of turbulence, whatever it be, You pervade everything as Water. You also transcend everything as Water. All the names and forms, the waves, the whirlpools, the foam, the bubbles, and the entire ocean are all just different names and forms, YOUR names and forms! You are just seeing yourself in different names and forms…..some auspicious and some inauspicious. But it all is YOU THE WATER! YOU ALONE ARE!

As Water, you are unborn and immortal. As Water, you are the imperishable material cause of both individual and total, the wave and the ocean. You were never born. You are undying. You survive every crisis. In fact, there is no crisis at all as Water. All crisis happens when you take your identity with a name and form seriously by giving it reality born out of ignorance. If you see what really is, if you really see that you are Water and nothing else, and you as the Water are the ever-enduring, all-pervading substratum, the only Absolute Reality there is, then no crisis can touch you, for there is no crisis at all in YOU, the changeless Water! As Water, you always have been and continue to be eternally liberated from all problems that pertain to names and forms and their modifications.

Know this as the real liberation. Real Liberation lies only in the clear seeing that you don’t need to be liberated for you are already eternally liberated. You need to see that you were never bound at all in the first place in order to be liberated! This is why the Māṇdūkya Upaniṣad asserts:

न निरोधो न चोत्पत्तिर्न बद्धो न च साधकः। 

न मुमुक्षुर्न वै मुक्त इत्येषा परमार्थता ॥

There is no real creation, there is no real dissolution, there is no one really bound, there is no real seeker, there is really no one desirous of liberation, and there is no one who is really liberated. This is the highest truth.

Māṇdūkya Upaniṣad 2.32

Any other liberation that promises some kind of “real attainment” of some sort is not liberation at all, it is just postponing the recognition of your already accomplished eternal liberation. The “I am this limited wave” notion arises out of ignorance of the fact that “I am the limitless all-pervading eternally liberated Water that was never bound at all”. With the rise of Self Knowledge, when you see that you are already the eternally liberated Water that you have always been, and you were never bound by any limitations at any time, the false idea that “I am this wave. I am bound, afflicted by limitations of the wave” drops off. You don’t have to make an effort to “become” the eternally liberated Water! Thus, no one really “gains” liberation. One just realizes that “Ah, I made a mistake due to not knowing myself clearly. I was never bound at all. I only mistakenly thought I was bound due to ignorance. Hence, I don’t even need liberation for I have always been eternally liberated.!”.

This shift in identity from taking myself to be a wave to knowing that I am really Water alone is all that is needed. When that happens, the problems of the wave just become a part of the play of names and forms that cannot really affect Me, the all-pervading limitless imperishable ever liberated Water!

Ramuː Amazing! Once you know this clearly, then what?

Guruː (Smiles) The one who knows this is a Jñānī wave. As a Jñānī, you can then put on the wave costume and act in the world. But then the world loses its capacity to cause any suffering as you now clearly know that whatever happens, happens only to the costume and not to YOU! Just as an actor is untouched by whether he plays the beggar or the king! If the waveform is going through a high or a low, you as Water are untouched, unaffected. The winds and storms of Karma will create all kinds of turbulence and bring about all kinds of modifications to names and forms. But none can affect you, the Water. Life then becomes a sport. Only a Jñānī truly enjoys life for all others are bogged down by their struggles for fulfillment, taking themselves to be limited individuals, which is an inevitable consequence of their ignorance.

Knowing this, you put on your wave costume and act. But once you know this, you never again do anything to gain fulfillment. There is no more acting out of a sense of lack, or out of seeking completeness. Because you are eternally independently fulfilled, you act out of your fullness and completeness.

When the winds of Karma are powerful and you cannot change something, you can accept it wholeheartedly in your unconditional limitless fullness. But when the situation demands action, you can also act decisively and do what needs to be done without any trace of ignorance, fear, insecurity, lack, or self-gratification motive.

Ramu: This is so Wonderful!

Guru: I have taught you that liberating knowledge. You will need to stabilize your mind in this knowledge. What you heard right now is called Shravaṇam (listening to the teacher). You also did some Mananam (clearing your own doubts). To really assimilate this, you need more Nididhyāsanam. I will explain this further.

The idea that you are a wave is deeply entrenched in your mind because you have reinforced the idea that you are a wave in countless past births. Even though you now know from this teaching that you are Water, the habit of taking yourself to be a wave will have a way of raising its ugly head again and again. To neutralize that habit, you need to recollect the teaching again and again and see that you are Water. The idea that you are really Water needs to conclusively and convincingly displace the idea that you are a wave. You need the ability to invoke and live this teaching when you encounter difficult situations because that is precisely when your tendency to take yourself to be a wave may also emerge out of sheer force of habit. You need to abide by this understanding that you are Water and deal with whatever life throws at you, and you need to abide in the knowledge that you are not affected, no matter what happens. You need to remember that you are the actor and not the role so that you don’t get carried away by the drama. The inertia of habit that makes you think you are a wave will lose its momentum over time as the ignorance to fuel it further is no more. Knowledge will prevail in the end.

For this, the mind has to soak in the teaching. So go back now and dwell on what I have taught you and live by it. This is Nididhyāsanam. Note that Nididhyāsanam is not for new knowledge. You already have the knowledge from my teaching. It is not for liberation either. Because you already also know that you are eternally liberated as Water. Nididhyāsanam is not for any mystic experience either. Nididhyāsanam is only to remove the deeply entrenched habitual thinking that you are a Wave from your system in the light of this knowledge that you are the Water.

Ramuː The implications of what you have taught me are enormous and beyond my wildest imagination. There is no way I could have figured this all out by myself. You have solved the key conundrum of life for me. All ups and downs in life as a wave have lost their hold over me. The wave samsāra, all of my miseries, struggles, and complaints, that I earlier had from the perspective of a wave, have evaporated. I was indeed missing this key fact about myself all along. That I am Water. I am not the wave I had taken myself to be out of Self Ignorance. This Wave is only a name and form, one of the countless names and forms that arise from Me, the Water.

मय्येव सकलं जातं मयि सर्वं प्रतिष्ठितम्। 

मयि सर्वं लयं याति तद्ब्रह्माद्वयमस्यहम्॥

In Me, all this is born. In Me, all this is sustained. In Me, all this resolves. That Non-Dual Reality I am.

Kaivalyopaniṣad 19

In Me, the Water, all the waves are born. In Me, the Water alone, all the waves are sustained. And in Me, the Water alone, all the waves resolve. The winds of Karma create, sustain and resolve all kinds of names and forms in Me, be they large waves, small waves, tsunamis, whirlpools, or just bubbles and foam. Whatever happens to these names and forms, I, the Water, am not affected. I, the Water, am the non Dual reality in this Ocean, that lends existence to all such names and forms. The entire Ocean with all of its varied and countless names and forms is Me alone in different costumes. I don’t even need liberation for as Water, I am eternally liberated, being free of all names and forms.

The awakened Wave who now knew that he was really Water put on his Ramu wave costume, and prostrated out of gratitude before his Guru, who he now knew was also really nothing but Water in Guru costume. They parted ways.

He would never again forget the precious teaching he received from his Guru. As Water, he alone was, is, and ever will be. Everything else, whether it be his own wave body, or whether it be other waves, or the totality of the ocean, were only his own names and forms that had no existence of their own. He was eternal and imperishable as Water. He was full and complete. He was liberated for he saw that he didn’t really need to be liberated as he had always been liberated.

He saw a menacing storm brewing right on his path ahead. “Yet another battle lies ahead”, he thought to himself. But there was a difference, a rather significant one this time around. He knew that he had already won the war. Ramu had indeed awakened from his dream-like wave existence.

ओम् श्रीगुरुभ्यो नमः