Bhagwan

Question: Who am I? How is it to be found?

Bhagavan: Ask yourself the question. The body (annamaya kosa) and its functions are not ‘I’. Going deeper, the mind (manomaya kosa) and its functions are not ‘I’. The next step takes on to the question. “Where from do these thoughts arise?” The thoughts are spontaneous, superficial or analytical. They operate in intellect.

Then, who is aware of them? The existence of thoughts, their clear conceptions and their operations become evident to the individual. The analysis leads to the conclusion that the individuality of the person is operative as the perceiver of the existence of thoughts and of their sequence. This individuality is the ego, or as people say ‘I’. Vijnanamaya kosa (intellect) is only the sheath of ‘I’ and not the ‘I’ itself. Enquiring further the questions arise, “Who is this ‘I’? Where from does it come?” ‘I’ was not aware in sleep. Simultaneously with its rise sleep changes to dream or wakefulness. But I am not concerned with dream just now. Who am I now, in the wakeful state?

If I originated from sleep, then the ‘I’ was covered up with ignorance. Such an ignorant ‘I’ cannot be what the scriptures say or the wise ones affirm. ‘I’ am beyond even ‘Sleep’; ‘I’ must be now and here and what I was all along in sleep and dreams also, without the qualities of such states. ‘I’ must therefore be the unqualified substratum underlying these three states (anandamaya kosa transcended). ‘I’ is, in brief, beyond the five sheaths. Next, the residuum left over after discarding all that is not-self is the Self, Sat-Chit-Ananda.

We are ever in sushupti. Becoming aware of it in jagrat is samadhi. The ajnani cannot remain long in sushupti because his ego pushes him out of it. The Jnani, although he has scotched the ego, it continues to rise again and again due to prarabdha. So, for both the Jnani and the ajnani the ego springs up, but with this difference: whereas the Jnani enjoys the transcendental experience, keeping its lakshya (aim, attention) always fixed on its source, … the ajnani is completely ignorant of it. The former is not harmful, being a mere skeleton of its normal self, like a burnt-up rope. By constantly fixing its attention on the Source, the Heart, the ego gets dissolved into it like a salt doll which has fallen into the ocean.

The State of non-emergence of “I” is the state of being THAT.

Therefore, leaving the corpse-like body as an actual corpse and remaining without even uttering the word 'I' by mouth, if one now keenly enquires, 'What is it that rises as 'I'? then in the Heart a certain soundless sphurana, 'I-I', will shine forth of its own accord. It is an awareness that is single and undivided, the thoughts which are many and divided having disappeared. If one remains still without leaving it, even the sphurana - having completely annihilated the sense of the individuality, the form of the ego, 'I am the body' - will itself in the end subside, just like the flame that catches the camphor. This alone is said to be liberation by great ones and scriptures.

Read on... to "Be Still & Know I Am"!