Self-inquiry as taught by Ramana Maharshi has the specific purpose of turning attention away from all objects of experience and directing it back toward the very sense of “I” itself. Instead of becoming absorbed in thoughts, sensations, roles, or stories about oneself, the inquiry asks what this “I” actually is. By doing so, it distinguishes between the transient body–mind complex and the deeper reality that knows these changing phenomena. This shift of attention is not meant to produce a new belief, but to expose the difference between the real Self and the constructed ego-identity.

Through persistently questioning “Who is this ‘I’?” and tracing the “I-thought” back to its source, the false identification with the body and mind is gradually undermined. All notions such as “I am this person,” “I am the body,” or “I am the mind” are seen as objects known, rather than the true knower. As these identifications are negated, the ego-sense that clings to them begins to dissolve. What remains, according to this teaching, is the Self: pure consciousness, eternal and unchanging, which is described as being-consciousness-bliss.

The purpose of this inquiry is therefore not intellectual analysis but direct Self-realization, often termed Atma-jnana. By abiding in the source from which the “I-thought” arises and into which it subsides, one comes to recognize that one’s essential nature is this ever-present awareness. This realization is said to free one from the fundamental ignorance that gives rise to psychological suffering and the sense of separation. In this way, self-inquiry functions as a direct path to liberation, or moksha, through the cessation of the ego and the stable abidance as the Self.