Post by Reefs on Jul 22, 2013 20:50:11 GMT -5
"It is not the ‘I am’ that is false, but what you take yourself to be. I can see, beyond the least shadow of doubt, that you are not what you believe yourself to be. Logic or no logic, you cannot deny the obvious. You are nothing that you are conscious of... You have not really understood that you are dreaming. This is the essence of bondage — the mixing of the real with unreal. In your present state only the sense ‘I am’ refers to reality; the ‘what’ and the ‘how I am’ are illusions imposed by destiny, or accident... All I can say truly is: ‘I am’, all else is inference....
People differ. But all are faced with the fact of their own existence. ‘I am’ is the ultimate fact; ‘Who am I?’ is the ultimate question to which everybody must find an answer... Give up all questions except one: ‘Who am I?’ After all, the only fact you are sure of is that you are. The ‘I am’ is certain. The ‘I am this’ is not... All you know is second-hand. Only ‘I am’ is first-hand and needs no proofs. Stay with it... whatever thoughts come to you in connection with the ‘I am’, empty them of all meaning, pay them no attention.
‘I am’ is ever afresh. You do not need to remember in order to be. As a matter of fact, before you can experience anything, there must be the sense of being. At present your being is mixed up with experiencing... You cannot say from your own experience that you are not. You can only say ‘I am’. Others too cannot tell you ‘you are not’... To know that you are is natural...
Before the mind — I am. ‘I am’ is not a thought in the mind; the mind happens to me, I do not happen to the mind. And since time and space are in the mind, I am beyond time and space, eternal and omnipresent... All states of mind, all names and forms of existence are rooted in non-inquiry, non-investigation, in imagination and credulity. It is right to say ‘I am’, but to say ‘I am this’, ‘I am that’ is a sign of not inquiring, not examining, of mental weakness or lethargy...
Beyond the mind there is no such thing as experience. Experience is a dual state. You cannot talk of reality as an experience. Once this is understood, you will no longer look for being and becoming as separate and opposite. In reality they are one and inseparable, like roots and branches of the same tree. Both can exist only in the light of consciousness, which again, arises in the wake of the sense ‘I am’. This is the primary fact. If you miss it, you miss all...
Just be. Do not try to be quiet; do not make ‘being quiet’ into a task to be performed. Don’t be restless about ‘being quiet’, miserable about ‘being happy’. Just be aware that you are and remain aware — don’t say: ‘yes, I am; what next?’ There is no ‘next’ in ‘I am’. It is a timeless state... Go back to that state of pure being, where the ‘I am’ is still in its purity before it got contaminated with ‘this I am’ or ‘that I am’. Your burden is of false self-identifications — abandon them all... When I say: remember ‘I am’ all the time, I mean: ‘come back to it repeatedly’....
Nothing you do will change you, for you need no change. You may change your mind or your body, but it is always something external to you that has changed, not yourself. Why bother at all to change? Realize once for all that neither your body nor your mind, nor even your consciousness is yourself and stand alone in your true nature beyond consciousness and unconsciousness. No effort can take you there, only the clarity of understanding. Trace your misunderstandings and abandon them, that is all. There is nothing to seek and find, for there is nothing lost. Relax and watch the ‘I am’. Reality is just behind it. Keep quiet, keep silent; it will emerge, or, rather, it will take you in...
All ambitions are for the sake of the ‘I am’. If you want to make real progress you must give up all ideas of personal attainment. The ambitions of the so-called Yogis are preposterous. A man’s desire for a woman is innocence itself compared to the lusting for an everlasting personal bliss. The mind is a cheat. The more pious it seems, the worse the betrayal... Why play with ideas? Be content with what you are sure of. And the only thing you can be sure of is ‘I am’. Stay with it, and reject everything else. This is Yoga."
- Niz
taken from "I AM THAT"
People differ. But all are faced with the fact of their own existence. ‘I am’ is the ultimate fact; ‘Who am I?’ is the ultimate question to which everybody must find an answer... Give up all questions except one: ‘Who am I?’ After all, the only fact you are sure of is that you are. The ‘I am’ is certain. The ‘I am this’ is not... All you know is second-hand. Only ‘I am’ is first-hand and needs no proofs. Stay with it... whatever thoughts come to you in connection with the ‘I am’, empty them of all meaning, pay them no attention.
‘I am’ is ever afresh. You do not need to remember in order to be. As a matter of fact, before you can experience anything, there must be the sense of being. At present your being is mixed up with experiencing... You cannot say from your own experience that you are not. You can only say ‘I am’. Others too cannot tell you ‘you are not’... To know that you are is natural...
Before the mind — I am. ‘I am’ is not a thought in the mind; the mind happens to me, I do not happen to the mind. And since time and space are in the mind, I am beyond time and space, eternal and omnipresent... All states of mind, all names and forms of existence are rooted in non-inquiry, non-investigation, in imagination and credulity. It is right to say ‘I am’, but to say ‘I am this’, ‘I am that’ is a sign of not inquiring, not examining, of mental weakness or lethargy...
Beyond the mind there is no such thing as experience. Experience is a dual state. You cannot talk of reality as an experience. Once this is understood, you will no longer look for being and becoming as separate and opposite. In reality they are one and inseparable, like roots and branches of the same tree. Both can exist only in the light of consciousness, which again, arises in the wake of the sense ‘I am’. This is the primary fact. If you miss it, you miss all...
Just be. Do not try to be quiet; do not make ‘being quiet’ into a task to be performed. Don’t be restless about ‘being quiet’, miserable about ‘being happy’. Just be aware that you are and remain aware — don’t say: ‘yes, I am; what next?’ There is no ‘next’ in ‘I am’. It is a timeless state... Go back to that state of pure being, where the ‘I am’ is still in its purity before it got contaminated with ‘this I am’ or ‘that I am’. Your burden is of false self-identifications — abandon them all... When I say: remember ‘I am’ all the time, I mean: ‘come back to it repeatedly’....
Nothing you do will change you, for you need no change. You may change your mind or your body, but it is always something external to you that has changed, not yourself. Why bother at all to change? Realize once for all that neither your body nor your mind, nor even your consciousness is yourself and stand alone in your true nature beyond consciousness and unconsciousness. No effort can take you there, only the clarity of understanding. Trace your misunderstandings and abandon them, that is all. There is nothing to seek and find, for there is nothing lost. Relax and watch the ‘I am’. Reality is just behind it. Keep quiet, keep silent; it will emerge, or, rather, it will take you in...
All ambitions are for the sake of the ‘I am’. If you want to make real progress you must give up all ideas of personal attainment. The ambitions of the so-called Yogis are preposterous. A man’s desire for a woman is innocence itself compared to the lusting for an everlasting personal bliss. The mind is a cheat. The more pious it seems, the worse the betrayal... Why play with ideas? Be content with what you are sure of. And the only thing you can be sure of is ‘I am’. Stay with it, and reject everything else. This is Yoga."
- Niz
taken from "I AM THAT"
