Fighting with a mind is like fighting with a shadow. If we try to fight it and kill it, we will always fail.

Annamalai Swami

 (from "Conversations with Annamalai Swami"):

Annamalai Swami: Bhagavan once told a story about a man who wanted to bury his own shadow in a deep pit. He dug the pit and stood in such a position that his shadow was on the bottom of it. The man then tried to bury it by covering it with earth. Each time he threw some soil in the hole the shadow appeared on top of it. Of course, he never succeeded in burying the shadow.

Many people behave like this when they meditate. They take the mind to be real, try to fight it and kill it, and always fail. These fights against the mind are all mental activities which strengthen the mind instead of weakening it.

If you want to get rid of the mind, all you have to do is understand that it is 'not me’. Cultivate the awareness 'I am the immanent consciousness’.

When that understanding becomes firm, the non-existent mind will not trouble you.

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Question: Swami frequently says that we should not identify with the body. If I reject the idea that this is my body, what other instrument can I use to realize the Self? Don't I need to identify with the body in some way in order to use it to do sadhana?

Annamalai Swami: You are wearing a shirt. Does this mean that you must take this shirt to be yourself? You wear a shirt to keep warm but you don't say, 'I am a shirt'. You can use the body as an instrument to realize the Self without thinking, 'I am the body'. Just regard the body as a helpful tool.