In plain words
Do not receive praise from anyone. Do not give to anyone. Do not take from anyone.
What Is Sākṣātkāra?
Stay as you are, as yourself: that itself is being the witness. That itself is sākṣāt ākāra. But I must see myself. Many keep hoping to experience it directly. This they call sākṣātkāra. Foreigners say liberation. What liberation means, what sākṣātkāra means, they themselves do not know, poor things. I want liberation. I want sākṣātkāram. What a wrong word this sākṣātkāram is! Sākṣāt ākāram. There is a mirror. You stand before the mirror. You see the form and are delighted: a great mistake. What you see in your mirror is not you. It is something other than you. The reflection in the mirror appears right side left side. How can that be sākṣāt ākāra? You are the sākṣāt; the pratyakṣa is the reflection. That is not sākṣātkāra. You take what is not sākṣātkāra to be sākṣātkāra. If you want to see yourself, you must search your inner being. Give up attachment to the body. Long for attachment to the Ātma. Through this attachment to the Ātma, sākṣātkāra is attained. Recognise the principle of the Ātma. This itself is the thing to be known in true humanness.
Ko'ham, So'ham
He is born as a man. He grows up as a man. He lives as a man. He dies as a man. No, no! When you were first born, what did you say as you were born? You were born saying, “Ko'ham, ko'ham.” ‘Ko'ham’ means: who am I, who am I? Every child that is born cries, “Ko'ham.” “Who am I?” If you keep going on saying “Ko'ham” until you die, what is the use of living? At the time of birth you were born saying, “Ko'ham.” You must die saying, “So'ham.” Only he who dies with that So'ham, that is, with the feeling “I myself am God”, is the true mukta. This itself is true liberation. But if, as long as you are in the world, you keep going on in Ko'ham alone, when will you ever see its Ānanda, your own svarūpa?