The Body: "i Am" / "i Own"

[Telepresent]

Something's just occured to me that I'd like to explore here for a moment.  It's a very fresh thought so I'd really value people's reflections!

I've debated with myself the whole "I am / I am not the body" question to death, and played all kinds of thought-experiments and mental exercises, to the point that I'm very comfortable saying that I know the experienced body is not me.  And yet, I still can't get away from a deeper, more embedded belief that it is.

Or so I thought.

It's just struck me: I don't talk/think in terms of being the body.  I talk/think in terms of owning the body.  Like some vehicle that I am piloting.  So it doesn't matter if (for example) I'm not controlling my heart beating, in the same way that when I drive a car I am not manually running electricity from the battery to the electrical components; I'm driving the damn thing even if some of the mechanisms don't require my direct input.  HOWEVER, I am the one that makes the car go faster, or slower, or left or right.  And (most of the time) it does what I want it to.

And that's the embedded view I have of the body.  Not that I am it, but that I own and pilot it.  And I can already see how loose that garment might prove to be, but it's wedged in there pretty tight at the moment. 

Whaddaya think?

Edited August 14, 2017 by Telepresent

[Leo Gura]

@Telepresent YOU DO NOT EXIST!

Cut all this "I", "I", "I" business. It's a word that points to nothing. Just a story. Just a word pointing to other words.

You might as well be spending your time figuring out how the Flying Spaghetti Monster is piloting that body.

There is no pilot.

[Shin]

[Guest username]

@Telepresent Notice how those are all thoughts. You have a mental model of what "you" are and how it all works. Just pay attention to what is. You need awareness, direct consciousness. Trying to explain it is getting in the way. This isn't something you can fathom.

[Shin]

Just meditate untill you can only be aware of awareness itself, it becomes obvious very quickly if you do it for quite some time.

 

[30secs]

3 hours ago, Telepresent said:

I'm very comfortable saying that I know the experienced body is not me.  And yet, I still can't get away from a deeper, more embedded belief that it is.

this is the crucial here, sometimes when I self inquiring I stop using "What am I?" or Who am I?, in the sense Im expecting myself as some kind of different form like awareness. What is there when you stop asking, there is peace, stillness and silence. You gonna be peace with it.

 

[Nahm]

@Telepresent you are the box in your avatar pic. The box is implied. Only implied. It is no-thing. IMO, you are going in the right direction. 'I am not my body' - is a big step. Currently, however, you seem to be identifying as your brain / thinking / thoughts. The next big step is becoming aware that you are not your thoughts - and then next step after that is that there is no "you" which has thoughts / no observer which observes the thoughts. There is no-thing, which we all are, through us / which has awareness. See how "we are all One"? No souls, no heaven & hell, no observer - just the one no-thing. (The one no-thing is pure love & bliss btw, yet also no-thing at all) (also, imo, it has an incredible sense of humor, and also is no-thing) 

To detach from your thoughts, which allows the next breakthrough, you must get started putting the focus in, doing the meditation. Continue the self inquiry. Start eating vegan. Excercising. Then you'll be feeling great. Assimilate the habit of breathing awareness 24/7 & BEING IN THE NOW. Past & future are merely thoughts in the now. Look at all things and say "that's not me".......Then try shrooms. Research it! You'll breakthrough. 

Continue that "path" of no path, and you're on your way to nothingness. (And it's fucking awesome, no fear, no doubt, everything makes sense, love pours out of you all day, miracles happen, birds chirp to you, water feels like a kindred spirit / best friend, people come out of the wood work with opportunities for you, funny is funnier, crazy is crazier!!! Animals will literally walk out of the woods and gaze into your eyes while you both experience - that you are no thing, Beautiful is true beauty itself, the stars pop right into place every time you look at them!, IT REALLY GETS AMAZING TELLY!! ....also...it's also no thing, plus, you'll be CRAZY!????)

 

 

[Moreira]

7 minutes ago, Nahm said:

@Telepresent you are the box in your avatar pic. The box is implied. Only implied. It is no-thing. IMO, you are going in the right direction. 'I am not my body' - is a big step. Currently, however, you seem to be identifying as your brain / thinking / thoughts. The next big step is becoming aware that you are not your thoughts - and then next step after that is that there is no "you" which has thoughts / no observer which observes the thoughts. There is no-thing, which we all are, through us / which has awareness. See how "we are all One"? No souls, no heaven & hell, no observer - just the one no-thing. (The one no-thing is pure love & bliss btw, yet also no-thing at all) (also, imo, it has an incredible sense of humor, and also is no-thing) 

To detach from your thoughts, which allows the next breakthrough, you must get started putting the focus in, doing the meditation. Continue the self inquiry. Start eating vegan. Excercising. Then you'll be feeling great. Assimilate the habit of breathing awareness 24/7 & BEING IN THE NOW. Past & future are merely thoughts in the now. Look at all things and say "that's not me".......Then try shrooms. Research it! You'll breakthrough. 

Continue that "path" of no path, and you're on your way to nothingness. (And it's fucking awesome, no fear, no doubt, everything makes sense, love pours out of you all day, miracles happen, birds chirp to you, water feels like a kindred spirit / best friend, people come out of the wood work with opportunities for you, funny is funnier, crazy is crazier!!! Animals will literally walk out of the woods and gaze into your eyes while you both experience - that you are no thing, Beautiful is true beauty itself, the stars pop right into place every time you look at them!, IT REALLY GETS AMAZING TELLY!! ....also...it's also no thing, plus, you'll be CRAZY!????)

 

 

How do you reach to the last point of no-thing? I've real several times in hunduist-buddhist books that we are the witness, the observer.

If we are nothing, who is the aware?

[SOUL]

"I am" riding the mind-body being on the present moment wave of existence as it manifests like someone rides a surfboard on the waves.

I don't own anything, I just 'borrow' for a moment in each moment with every moment I have the moment to be .... now ... here.

Edited August 15, 2017 by SOUL

[Nahm]

@Moreira  The observer is a good thing, or place to be along the path. No association with the mind's concepts, with all the traps. Good place to be. But the no thing is in your question already - when you say "If we are no thing, who is aware", the no thing, the pure center of love itself, is the "is" in your statement. It just is. And of course, it isn't. It's no thing, as in, we are familiar with "things"; chairs, fruit, gravity - it is nothing like anything thing at all.  You reach the last point of no thing (pure unabashed love and bliss) by letting go of everything else; preferences, choices, perspective, concepts, etc. 

[Space]

@Telepresent Although if you got stabbed or you got stung by a wasp, then you'd say "you stabbed me!", and "it stung me!". What you're saying is definitely correct, although as many have pointed out, and i'm sure you know, there is no controller or user of the body. But you're right in the sense that we do believe we are the controllers of our bodies. However, we also think we are our bodies, it just depends on the circumstance. The ego moulds itself to the situation, which we've become so accustomed to that it seems normal. Sometimes we are our bodies, and sometimes we think we are controlling the body. 

[Telepresent]

Wow - thanks everyone!  A lot to consider further here

10 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Cut all this "I", "I", "I" business

That's the bloody trick, isn't it?  This reply is a conscious effort to respond to everyone without using that word, but it's a constant filtering out: "I" wants to come and must be moved aside every time.  Every sentence.  Even while understanding and agreeing with what you say on one level, on another more entrenched level the word "I" persists in its insistance that is has substance.  More work, more work...

@username Yeah.  The wannabe explanations are bloody persistent, though!  It's the seeing through them that's a slow slog, although it seems that in attempting/fighting to explain or define them, and truly recognising the futility of that, they fall away.  To be replaced with another set of beliefs, and the work begins anew...

@Nahm Thank you.  You're right about identification with thoughts/mind - and it's a frustration!  But the encouragement is very much appreciated

@Space Very true.  Once again, a definitive statement proves false...

@Shin Ha! 

Edited August 15, 2017 by Telepresent

[Guest username]

@Telepresent Learn to not take your beliefs too seriously. Just see them for what they are, then the content of the thought makes no difference. It's just a thought. It's exactly as it appears.

[Leo Gura]

25 minutes ago, Telepresent said:

That's the bloody trick, isn't it?  This reply is a conscious effort to respond to everyone without using that word, but it's a constant filtering out: "I" wants to come and must be moved aside every time.  Every sentence.  Even while understanding and agreeing with what you say on one level, on another more entrenched level the word "I" persists in its insistance that is has substance.  More work, more work...

Yes, that's where self-inquiry comes in.

It is helpful to clarify what exactly you're identifying with when you say "I". Find that identification and question it to hell. Don't let the mind be vague about it. What is being identified as "the pilot"? Is it the world "I"? The inner voice? A feeling in the chest? A feeling behind the eyes? What? Whatever it is, once it's found, notice that it's just a feeling/sound/image. And then wonder, "Why would that feeling/sound/image be me?"

[Joseph Maynor]

18 hours ago, Telepresent said:

Something's just occured to me that I'd like to explore here for a moment.  It's a very fresh thought so I'd really value people's reflections!

I've debated with myself the whole "I am / I am not the body" question to death, and played all kinds of thought-experiments and mental exercises, to the point that I'm very comfortable saying that I know the experienced body is not me.  And yet, I still can't get away from a deeper, more embedded belief that it is.

Or so I thought.

It's just struck me: I don't talk/think in terms of being the body.  I talk/think in terms of owning the body.  Like some vehicle that I am piloting.  So it doesn't matter if (for example) I'm not controlling my heart beating, in the same way that when I drive a car I am not manually running electricity from the battery to the electrical components; I'm driving the damn thing even if some of the mechanisms don't require my direct input.  HOWEVER, I am the one that makes the car go faster, or slower, or left or right.  And (most of the time) it does what I want it to.

And that's the embedded view I have of the body.  Not that I am it, but that I own and pilot it.  And I can already see how loose that garment might prove to be, but it's wedged in there pretty tight at the moment. 

Whaddaya think?

The next stage is to realize that your belief that you are at the center of things is an illusion.  But even that is a story.  You as a body-mind-brain don't exist.  But even that is a story.  What exists is reality being aware of itself, and reality is everything moving as one giant flow without distinction.  But even that is a story.  And Reality being itself just is you.  But even that is a story.  You are not a thing but the non-dual reality being itself.  But even that is a story.  You are the atmosphere that is aware of all the clouds moving though it, yet you are not the clouds.  But even that is a story.  Reality is not conceptually capturable, it is idealism.  It is what is -- stripped of our thought-stories about it.  It is being that.  Knowing it by being it.  But even that is a story  Everything you see around you is not physical.  It's a non-dual substance.  But even that's a story. Nothing is what is conscious of everything.  It's just one being.  But even that's a story. Nature is nothingness.  And that's what you are.  It has no properties, no features.  It doesn't exist or not exist.  But even that's a story.  Fall into the godhead.  This is the ultimate nature of reality.  Where there are no distinctions and you are aware you are nothing, and that everything is you.  Absolute Infinity is right in front of you.  BUT . . . .  Need I go on?  

Do you see by not-seeing what I am pointing/ not-pointing to?  Enlightenment is an odd sort of reading between the lines.  But, yes, even that is a little story, a little hairless-monkey fairy-tale we tell ourselves to feel like we know.  To satisfy our need to know, our need for certainty.  Our human/egoic urge for conceptual resolution, for understanding -- that succulent, tantalizing fruit we can't resist -- like Eve not minding God and wanting to feast on such forbidden-fruit from the Tree of Knowledge in the Garden of Eden.  After God found out about this little fruit-picking transgression, He said, get the hell outta here and don't come back!  Don't be pickin' no fruit from my Tree of Knowledge.  I told you explicitly not to do this.  Jeez!  

Edited August 15, 2017 by Joseph Maynor

[Ramu]

@Telepresent Hey bud!  You know what really helped me along quite rapidly is a website called Headless.org.  Do the experiments.  Sign up for the daily reflections.  Its really all just self inquiry designed to show you who you really are.

[Telepresent]

@Ramu  Thanks!  That looks like a great resource

[Ramu]

@Telepresent no problem man.  The pointing experiment is the most revealing.  It reveals..nothingness.  It reveals that emptiness at center is Source for everything.  You are capacity for everything.  Having a turbulent day?  Turbulence out there and calmness at center.

[30secs]

sometimes I feel like the Infinity is like a giant eye ball , it cannot look back to Himself. It only aware that He is already it. Look at your hand, your not looking at your hand the hand is already part of you. Look at the tree, your not looking at the tree the tree is already you. Remove the "I" or the personality you believed, there just hand, body,  tree and the infinite universe which are all One. The Beingness of the Infinity which is totally nothing in substance. 

Edited August 16, 2017 by 30secs