Chapter-11, Verse 6

Ashtavakra Gita Verse 11.6

नाहं देहो न मे देहो बोधोऽहमिति निश्चयी। कैवल्यमिव संप्राप्तो न स्मरत्यकृतं कृतम्॥६॥

6. ‘I am not the body, nor is the body mine, I am Pure Intelligence’ – he who has understood this with certitude, does no longer remember what he ‘has done’ or what he ‘has not done’, as if he has attained the state of aloneness (kaivalya). 

When a seeker has mentally rejected the ‘not-Self’ and has ascertained his own Nature as the Self even during the intense moments of his sādhanā, he unconsciously admits to a flood of peace filling him, in which he apparently forgets to worry over what he ‘has done,’ or what he has ‘not yet done’. 

To worry over what has been done, is the habit of the human mind, to drag back from the dead past his memories to muddy the pool of the present. Some not only get worried with regrets of their past, but also are anxious for their future and this is indicated by the term here ‘what has not yet been done’. It is a human mind’s habit to worry over actions both committed and omitted. 

When the student has gone through the practice, that has been advised here, he comes to discover within himself such a peaceful state of utter contentment, that therein he learns to live the dynamic present, supremely happy and peaceful and Aṣṭāvakra adds: ‘As though he has reached kaivalya – the Supreme State of the aloneness of the Self’. 

Kaṭhopaniṣad also advises the same. It guarantees and assures the same condition of inner peace and aloneness in the following words: ‘When the five organs of knowledge are at rest together with the mind, and when the intellect ceases functioning (becomes calm), that they call the highest state.’ (yadā pañcāvatiṣṭhante jñānāni manasā saha, buddhiśca na viceṣṭate tāmāhuḥ paramāṁ gatim.  ~Kaṭhopaniṣad-2.6.10)

The ideas of ‘I’ and ‘my’ are the expressions of the ego, and when the deeper understanding dawns in a seeker, ‘I am not the body, nor is the body mine’, the egocentric subject ends and the ego awakes to the realisation of its divine Selfhood. 

Sings Mahopaniṣad: ‘The two terms – bondage and Liberation are nothing but the tyranny of mineness and the total rejection of this mineness; by the sense of mineness, the creature gets bound and is liberated when the sense of mineness has ended.’ (dve pade bandhamokṣākhyaṁ nirmameti mameti ca, mameti badhyate janturnirmameti vimucyate.  ~Mahopaniṣad-4.72)