Within Advaita Vedanta, meditation and self-inquiry are regarded as primary means for realizing the non-dual identity of Atman and Brahman. Meditation initially functions as a discipline to purify and steady the mind, reducing distraction and emotional turbulence so that the teachings can be properly assimilated. As the mind becomes more stable, meditation deepens into sustained contemplation on the great statements of the tradition, such as the understanding that one is pure awareness rather than body, mind, or social identity. This contemplative phase, often described as abiding in the recognition of the Self, serves to dissolve residual doubts and habitual misidentifications, allowing knowledge of non-dual reality to become firm and direct.

Self-inquiry, or Atma Vichara, is presented as a particularly direct approach within this framework. The central movement of this inquiry is the question “Who am I?”, pursued not as an abstract speculation but as a rigorous examination of the sense of “I.” Through systematically negating identification with body, mind, emotions, and thoughts—“not this, not this”—the seeker traces the “I”-thought back to its source. In this process, the separate ego-self is seen as a construct, and what remains is recognized as the ever-present witnessing consciousness that Advaita identifies with Brahman. Thus self-inquiry does not create a new state, but reveals the true Self that was never absent.

Meditation and self-inquiry are not viewed as ends in themselves, but as means that remove ignorance and the mental habits that obscure what is already the case. Meditation quiets the mind and establishes a stance of witness consciousness, providing the inner stillness in which self-inquiry can be genuinely effective. As understanding matures, these two modes of practice converge into a natural abidance in non-dual awareness, sometimes described as effortless dwelling in one’s own true nature. In this mature state, the distinction between seeker, seeking, and sought falls away, and what remains is the non-dual reality that Advaita Vedanta has always pointed toward.