This Chapter is taken From The Book ”Guru Ramana – Memories and Notes” by S.S.Cohen

19th June, 1936

1. A visitor wanted to know if there was such a thing as Free-Will.

Bh: Whose will is it? So long as there is the sense of doership, there is the sense of enjoyment and of individual will. But if this sense is lost through the practice of vichara, the Divine will, will act and guide the course of events. Fate is overcome by Jnana, Self-knowledge, which is beyond Will and Fate.

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9th November, 1936

2. Mr C. asks where the will is located in the sheaths of the jiva.

Bh: The Will is the purposive force of the ‘I’, which determines and impels an act. It is thus inherent in the ‘I’. In which sheath is it located? It must be where the ‘I’-sense is, namely, in the vijnanamayakosha.

Annamayakosha is the physical sheath. Pranamayakosha is the sheath of the life and sense. Manomayakosha is that of thoughts and sense-perceptions – of subject and object: and vijnanamayakosha is the sheath of the ‘I’-sense, where the self-conscious individual wills and determines. It is really unnecessary to go into all this detail. What we should be concerned with is the true nature of the ‘I’, which is the pivot of all these sheaths and worlds. The true ‘I’ is the Supreme Reality.

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19th May, 1936

3. A French Doctor of Philosophy came for the day. He asked: “How should a seeker work?”

Bh: Without taking himself to be the actor, that is he should work without motive or a hard-cast plan. For instance, when you started on a journey from Paris did you include this place in your itinerary?

Dr: No.

Bh: Now you see how you came without previous planning.

The Gita says that no one can remain inactive, and that the purpose of one’s birth will be fulfilled whether one wills it or not. It is therefore wise to allow the purpose to be fulfilled by itself.

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10th February, 1944

4. In this connection it is relevant to record here a single instance of how the Divine Will automatically acted to the benefit of a devotee through an unpremeditated action.

About a month ago Shiva, one of the Master’s attendants, was for some reason dismissed from service, and he immediately left for his village. Last night he returned and related the following story to Sri Bhagavan in our presence.

He said:-

“As I detrained at the railway station of my village on the next day of my leaving the Ashram, about a month ago, I saw a relation of mine there. Seeing me, he came running and shouted: ‘Hello, you have come, I was just going to send you this telegram. Your father is dying and wants to see you badly.’ I was stunned and realised that I had been dismissed from service so that I might be there in time. When I entered my home, my father, who had not been opening his eyes or talking, suddenly opened them and, seeing me, smiled and said: ‘At last you have come, santosham (I am happy).’ After an hour he breathed his last.”