Maya is transcended merely by knowing Maya as it truly is,
Maya is not any solid object existing somewhere outside, yet it appears as the experience of the entire world.
Therefore, if someone says, “This whole world is Maya,” he is not wrong; and if someone says, “Maya has no existence of its own,” he too cannot be proven wrong. This is the peculiarity of Maya—it both is and is not.
So the question arises—what exactly is this Maya? People casually say “everything is Maya,” but they rarely understand the depth of this statement.
The one who is saying “this is Maya” is also a part of that same Maya. If the world is Maya, then certainly ‘you’, who consider yourself to be body and mind, also stand within Maya.
Seekers, Maya cannot be easily confined into words, yet understanding it is essential. For without knowing the nature of Maya, freedom from its delusion is not possible. Knowing Maya is half liberation, and rising above it is complete liberation.
How does Maya appear to us in the form of the world?
Maya does not exist in the true sense. It is only a grand illusion—so vast that within it the entire universe appears as an experience.
Reality is not what our eyes see, nor what our intellect grasps; because true reality lies beyond the reach of the senses.
We must remember that we are jivas—limited. Our senses are limited, our intellect is limited, our experience is limited. Therefore, whatever we see and hear, we immediately assume it to be the truth. Yet this world is complete in itself, but we see it through a distorted lens; thus it never appears to us as it actually is.
The sages realized that reality can be experienced in two ways: one—through the senses, as ordinary beings perceive; the other—by turning the senses inward and being established in consciousness, as the yogi perceives.
The surprising thing is that the difference between these two is like earth and sky. What is seen through the senses is one type of world; and what is seen through consciousness is a completely different reality.
Truth is only Atman. Atman is both the manifest and the unmanifest. It appears as the universe, and it abides in silence, in the unknowable.
But this body is merely a puppet made of the earth’s dust. When out of ignorance the jiva considers this body as its final nature, it falls into the great net of Maya. Reality becomes blurred for him—what is not-self appears as self, and the net of Maya seems to be the only truth. What is non-dual begins to appear dual, what is without distinctions begins to appear full of distinctions. From this delusion, suffering arises, and peace is lost.
Atman cannot be known, because it is beyond the knower. Yet for the senses, a small fragment of it appears as the world—which we mistakenly accept as truth.
How does Maya cause you suffering?
When a person considers the body to be his final nature, he begins to accept this illusory world as his home, his base, and his truth. This is the greatest mistake. This is the very root-play of Maya.
When you accept the unreal as real, suffering is bound to arise.
A human being remains unaware of his blissful nature, therefore a sense of incompleteness settles within. This incompleteness itself is the jiva-state, born from ignorance of one’s true nature. To remove it, the person relies on the world—wealth, desire, status, progress, pleasures, recognition.
But this solution backfires, because the problem lies within and the remedy is being sought outside. This is why the more a person runs outward, the more dry, tired, hopeless, and sorrowful he becomes. This running traps him deeper into the net of Maya. Eventually, bliss is lost, and sorrow becomes the nature of life.
Understand the jiva like a puppet whose string is in the hands of Maya. Maya moves it at her fingertips, and the jiva dances—not out of joy, but out of helplessness.
The problem is that the jiva keeps seeking solutions in the wrong direction, therefore the suffering only increases. Until he looks within, nothing can change.
Establishment in Atman is complete liberation from Maya,
One should not get entangled in Maya; one must simply hold the firm understanding that Maya is not trustworthy. It shows the illusion of happiness but ends by giving sorrow.
Complete liberation from Maya comes only when the seeker becomes established in the non-dual nature of Atman—where there is no conflict, no fear, no lack. There is only pure existence, pure peace, and effortless bliss.
For this, the practice of Neti-Neti, meditation, Bhakti Yoga, Jnana Yoga, and Raja Yoga—all these means lift the seeker upward, beyond the net of Maya, and connect him with the inner truth.
But to remove ignorance of one’s true nature, dispassion is necessary—a kind of indifference that arises not from hatred, but from the deep understanding that what I seek is not in the world. As soon as this realization awakens, the inner search begins. This is the right direction, this is the true beginning.
Spirituality is the place where every knot of your life has a solution.
If life itself has become the problem, spirituality transforms life itself. It lifts you out of deception and unites you with the highest truth—the truth that is eternal.
