Would someone be willing to guide me please?

[kvotski]

Hi Matt

But when things are less quiet the idea of me still steps in and takes over the experience.

That's excellent. it is the "idea" of you. this idea will keep coming back until the habit of seeing it just as an idea becomes entrenched. So look and keep confirming that this is just an idea, a thought, evaporating the next minute. Surely you should last more than a flash.

It feels like I am playing some sort of mental gymnastics game, splitting attention and getting one part of the mind to pretend it's watching another. Meanwhile the sense of 'I' pops in and out of existence, hiding when I look and taking over when I revert to habitual behaviour.

Look at the "I" playing this game, making a miraculous split into two. Are they really two? If you say you are handsome and you say you are not. Are there two of you saying that? or are they simply two thoughts conflicting as they may be.

Here is another experiment a fellow guide has talked about. Close your eyes and think of the "I" and point. Wait a minute and then open your eyes. What are you pointing at?

Slow progress means lasting results, so don't lose patience. I am the world's slowest reader but always got an A in exams. Its not how fast we get it but we get it is the point.

[kvotski]

Check out my blog,

How can you be sure you have seen through the illusion of self?

[Matt13]

Look at the "I" playing this game, making a miraculous split into two. Are they really two? If you say you are handsome and you say you are not. Are there two of you saying that? or are they simply two thoughts conflicting as they may be.

Yes! That clicked. Of course. It doesn't mean that experience isn't dominated by a thought, but it really puts it into perspective.

Here is another experiment a fellow guide has talked about. Close your eyes and think of the "I" and point. Wait a minute and then open your eyes. What are you pointing at?

No idea what the right answer is. I tried this and I couldn't point at anything. When I close my eyes and look I can't find an 'I'.

Slow progress means lasting results, so don't lose patience. I am the world's slowest reader but always got an A in exams. Its not how fast we get it but we get it is the point.

Cool - I'm going to get an A! :-)

[Matt13]

Check out my blog,

How can you be sure you have seen through the illusion of self?

I really liked that post Sunil. It gives me the marker I am after I think. As long as thoughts trigger suffering and I am losing myself in that, I can assume that I haven't truly rid myself of the belief in self. I accept that the thought of self will always appear, it's the dominance of the thought that gives me doubts that I am seeing this.

[kvotski]

. As long as thoughts trigger suffering and I am losing myself in that, I can assume that I haven't truly rid myself of the belief in self. I accept that the thought of self will always appear, it's the dominance of the thought that gives me doubts that I am seeing this.

Suffering such as fear, anger or jealousy is a thought. Certain inevitable events trigger this thought that becomes suffering because you take it personally which is the illusion of self. It's case of mistaken identity. There may be an expectation of failure causing worry, a legitimate action for the body to protect itself. It's when a thought comes and says "I" am worried that the mistake has just been made. An unnecessary event in an otherwise very natural process. You realize this. But there is reluctance to make it yours. Why?

[Matt13]

It feels as if it all comes back to the automatic association of 'I' to everything. If the 'I' starts to be revealed as just a thought, then that realisation becomes automatically associated with the 'I'. So 'I' have a realisation that the 'I' is just a thought, and so on it goes, round and round in circles. This 'I' thought feels well embedded. I can never accept that I is just a thought because that is accepting that I is not real - it's committing suicide. When I think about this it's like a mental deadlock.

[kvotski]

I can never accept that I is just a thought because that is accepting that I is not real - it's committing suicide. When I think about this it's like a mental deadlock.

Think deep and hard again, what would be different if the "I" did disappear. Spend a day seeing what would change in your life. Suicide has two components, the body and the mind. We love the body, it is the mind of thoughts embedded in which is this I that is an impostor. So what harm will come to the body when the belief that there is an I orchestrating all this is gone? For that matter what harm do you expect will come to the mind? Thinking will still go on, problem solving, loving, even fear and and anger. Nothing changes. Just the suffering that is associated with an illusion. Look. what changes?

[kvotski]

It feels as if it all comes back to the automatic association of 'I' to everything. If the 'I' starts to be revealed as just a thought, then that realisation becomes automatically associated with the 'I'. So 'I' have a realisation that the 'I' is just a thought, and so on it goes, round and round in circles.

On this circular process, this is definitely a problem faced by many on the path. How can I think that I am just a thought? How can a knife be used to cut itself?

It is like a final thought about I. Once convinced, there is no question of an I being a thought any more for I doesn't exist. So habitually you attach the I to some thought and then a thought immediately pops in and says there is no i. There is just seeing, hearing, happening all by itself.

Papaji talks of using a thorn to remove a thorn from your foot.

I think of it like desire for liberation. You can say that too is a desire. So how can we desire to get rid of desire?

All desires cease when you acquire them. No need for a new car if you just got one, or a beautiful mate or a nice job or a great child. So the desire ends after it is achieved. Unfortunately physical desires have no end, you want something else and on and on. But once you are liberated, you are liberated from all desires and so you desire no more.

I is much the same way, realise the illusion and no more association of I with anything including the 'reallisation that I is just a thought".

this is not simple, you really have to contemplate on this and soon it will pop.

[Matt13]

Think deep and hard again, what would be different if the "I" did disappear. Spend a day seeing what would change in your life.

Look. what changes?

Nothing and everything would change, surely? Nothing because the I is just a thought, so all that would happen is that this particular thought would no longer have any power to take over experience. Everything because, up to now at least, that thought of I has appeared to be the whole of experience. It's not, but it thinks it is, and it wants to stay.

[kvotski]

Nothing and everything would change, surely? Nothing because the I is just a thought, so all that would happen is that this particular thought would no longer have any power to take over experience. Everything because, up to now at least, that thought of I has appeared to be the whole of experience. It's not, but it thinks it is, and it wants to stay.

why do you think that the thought of I has been your whole experience? Are we talking about the same experience? To me experience is sensing, feeling, jumping, eating, listening and loving etc. How can a thought have these experiences? Check. When does laughing become you laughing? Isn't it that the I thought claims it after the event? If the I doesn't take credit for your feeling of touch, does it become a different experience? This is critical.

[Matt13]

You're right Sunil, loose language on my part. It would be better to say that the I claims the whole experience. So, at the immediate moment of sensing the I is not involved, then the thought of I arises and claims the experience. But that also means that if I look back through my memories they are all claimed by the I. So if the I were to vanish, be seen as an illusion, all of that long story of my memories has to die, or be seen as a lie.

[kvotski]

Bingo

[kvotski]

Bingo

Why do you think, they call this a dream? All that is going on is life, an incredible miracle of life. An illusion is created as part of this life which is named by parents, society, convention as self which promptly takes credit for this life and all of this life, calling it me, mine and yours. What a lie!

Whether you let it become the truth that seeps into your body and mind or not, that my friend is the truth and you know it.

Let me know when you are ready for some final questions to test how well done is your steak. Hope you r not a vegetarian...

[Matt13]

Hi Sunil,

Happy to answer any questions you have. I reflexively want to say that I still have doubts and still do not see fully, but perhaps I do. I understand this intellectually. When I look I know there is no I there because it cannot be found. Moment to moment experience is still habitually claimed by the I thought, but there is another constant thought reminding that the I is not real. Even as I scatter the letter I through my sentences there is a background awareness that these are just thoughts arising and fingers typing. Is this it?

Matt

P.S. not at all vegetarian, as my just-eaten and delicious chicken curry will attest :)

[kvotski]

Yes, this is it. Often there aren't any fireworks and many people doubt their new knowing because it is really that simple. But I want to check this reflexive you that still has doubts. Tell me what it is?

I also want to know how you really feel? Bare your soul.