Letters from Sri Ramanasramam 524
nothing else. Only if we are fickle-minded, everything comes upon us.”
The young man could not understand the significance of Bhagavan’s words and so sat there absorbed in his own thoughts, downcast. Bhagavan’s heart melted on seeing him and addressing a devotee seated nearby, said, “Look. If we are not existent, what is there outside to see? The scenery that is shown in a cinema is within the reel of the film. It is wound round and round within the reel wherein it is merged. It can be seen only if and when a hall is hired, a curtain is erected, a light is projected across the reel and the reel is unwound. If all that paraphernalia is removed and the reel is again wound up, the scenery on the screen ceases to exist. The picture and the scenery are all from the reel only. The world also is like that. This body is like a rented house. The jrva gets into it and enacts a drama. The breath of life is like a watchman at the gate. During sleep, the jiva goes to his original place and, on the body waking, comes back. Meanwhile, so long as the watchman, known as the breath of life, is there, no one else can get inside the body. Usually when dogs or thieves want to get into a house, they look this way and that and if they find that there is a watchman, they run away saying there is someone at the gate. Otherwise they get in and do all sorts of damage. The house known as the body is also like that. Even if the srva is away, leaving the breath of life to watch the body, all living beings first come close to see if there is breath left in the body. If there is breath in the body, they say the owner is in and so go away. If there is no inhaling and exhaling of breath, they get in and do whatever they please. When the jiva does not like the house, he leaves it and he takes away along with him the watchman also. He wanders from one house to
another saying this is no good and that is no good until at