Ramana Maharshi believed that death and evil were illusion which could be dissipated by the practice of ‘Vichara’, by which the true self and the unity of all things would be discovered. Self-examination is the principal means to remove ignorance and abide in self-awareness together with bhakti (devotion) or surrender to the self. Among his sayings of note are:
“A man does not have to go and find where his eyes are in order to see.”
“We not only come into this world with our physical bodies as something of a spacesuit our soul puts on, but that all of ‘our’ changing worlds we perceive about us are just our own reflections on the mirror surface of our awareness.”
“Being is awareness. It cannot be experienced as an object, as a sensation, or mental state because it is non-dual. We can only BE it. It is always available if we drop all thinking, wanting or any form of mental activity for a moment and rest as IT.'”