Nisargadatta Maharaj sold hand-rolled cigarettes in a tiny shop in Mumbai. He had almost no formal education, lived in poverty, and chain-smoked his entire life—even while dying of throat cancer. Yet he became one of the most profound spiritual teachers of the 20th century, and his book ‘I Am That’ is considered a masterpiece of non-dual philosophy.*
*If enlightenment can happen to a cigarette seller who never stopped smoking, what does that mean for the rest of us?*
*No fancy ashrams. No special powers. No pretense of holiness.*
*Just a beedi seller in Mumbai who saw through the illusion of the separate self—and never stopped being ordinary.”*