AHAM’s founder and spiritual director, Arunachala Ramana (Mr. Dee W. Trammell), underwent radical, spiritual transformation or enlightenment in a very mysterious and illogical manner, in which he was strangely drawn to a bookstore in Houston, Texas. Going to the bookstore on this particular occasion was untimely, even against his will and his better judgment, because he was en route to an appointment he had agreed to keep and was expected to attend, and for which he was running late. Nevertheless, he obeyed the compulsive urge to go by the bookstore. There he had a very unexpected “meeting” with his then “unknown” guru, Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi, who had dropped his physical body in 1950. It was to a book on the teachings of the great sage that Ramana was unknowingly, though compulsively and mysteriously drawn.
Opening the book, it revealed a picture of the sage. On gazing into the sage’s very clear, compassionate eyes in the picture, a very deep spiritual stirring occurred in the very Core and Heart of Ramana’s being, resulting in his spontaneously Awakening to the true Self.
From that finalizing, life transforming event, Ramana has since seen the importance of making AHAM’s teaching, and in particular the great benefit of the pure Conscious Teachings of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi, known and available in book form. It is based simply on anyone’s ability to intentionally return consciousness, or the mind, back into the prior pure Awareness, which is the true Self, by the direct and immediate process of Self-Inquiry.
Ramana shares his awakening experience here, in his own words:
“The most important day of my life, undeniably, was June 4, 1973 in Houston, Texas, when the grace of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi drew me — against my will at the time — into a bookstore and literally, simultaneously placed my eye and hand on a book of His teachings.
On picking the book from the shelf it was like He “caused” it to be opened directly to the very page containing His photograph. In that instant, or what was more like a extended lapse into eternity, the “I” — or sense of being a separate-self — melted into the All-ness of Being, and the pure re-cognition (direct knowing) that this ALLNESS is the Truth of all beings, and “I” merged into IT, which is also His undeniably wise, loving, divine radiance shining through those most compassionate and yet transfixing eyes. In rapid succession, as a direct yet continuing experience, the “separate-self” sense was consumed whole-bodily in the spiritual Heart, which was immediately shown as being always ever alive, in that unending, infinite, and eternal moment.
“That, which I had for so long desired, and incessantly sought, was now instantly realized as having been all along hidden or covered up due to misidentification with the body-mind, and its conditioned self-image as being “me.” The true Self was in the moment mystically Awakened by what was seen and known as the One Presence, radiating from and as His Divine Presence; but there was not two, or no "other," there was (is) only this One Presence. And, IT is ever radiating or pulsating deeply and magnificently within me, as me, and also simultaneously known to be in Him as Him — not different. In that everlasting instant, which still remains, there was (is) the unmistakable recognition of IT always, already being the very Presence of simple Awareness, even during all the previous forgetfulness!
“In what was ‘the twinkling of an eye,’ the ‘self’ I had always considered myself to be — the ‘self’ of name and form, of a personality with a bodily history — was instantly, totally merged in the One Self, the spiritual Heart, and has ever remained as such since that fateful day.
We stock all of A. (Arunachala)
Ramana’s books, along with almost 400 titles by various Conscious
Teachers, approximately 135 of them being by or about Bhagavan Sri Ramana
Maharshi.
See Our
Catalog for the selections directly available from AHAM and place order by
using the PayPal shopping cart buttons provided. Further ordering information available here.
Also, visit the Listening
Library for AHAM's audio selection.