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How to Withdraw From the Sense-Objects
All things other than Atman are unreal. The differences caused by them such as “He is a Brahmin,” “He is a Sudra,” “He is a householder,” “He is a Sannyasin,” the different destinations such as Svarga and many acts of Karma which are the causes of various fruits and even Karma itself are all unreal like things seen by one in a dream.
He who enjoys in the wakeful state through all his senses the objects external and transient, and who in dreams experiences objects similar to them in his mind, who in sleep withdraws himself from them all, is one and the same Atman - the witness of the three states and the Lord of the senses. This is proved from the persistence of memory in all these states. The same memory runs through all these states.
Reflect well over this, that the three states of the mind are caused in Me by the Gunas through My Maya. Knowing this definitely annihilate egoism which is the source of all doubts by the sword of knowledge, sharpened by reasoning and the precepts of the great sages and the Srutis, and worship Me who dwells in the heart.
Look upon this universe as a delusion, a play of the mind, now seen and the next moment destroyed, like a dream, and extremely inconsistent like the circle described by a firebrand [1]. One consciousness appears as many. The threefold distinction of waking, dream and deep-sleep which is caused by the transformation of Gunas is Maya.
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