Steps to awakening-Part 6
Who I Am
Of course we are all human beings living a human life. But the background of nothing-ness is you and who you really are. It is helpful to focus on this ever-present being-ness – this something of you that is conscious, watchful, loving but also uninvolved whenever you do some quiet sitting or meditation.
Some describe this as Spirit, or even God. Again, these are just words. Love is the quality of what we all really are. This consciousness that is you, is the same as the consciousness that is me – it is everything and everybody.
When the ego (the ‘I’ thought), dissolves through inquiry, you see that there is no separate you at all – just Being. Then you start to become more spacious and your heart opens with genuine love for life itself.
This is not an intellectual understanding, (although knowledge is part of it), because insight always comes from the heart and never the mind. But when we are very quiet, there may be a visceral sense that is felt in the heart area and even the whole body of this Presence and love for everything. From this, you see others as yourself - there is no separation.
Spiritual, or not Spiritual. It Doesn’t Matter. It’s just about Identity.
I asked my Vedanta teacher once if it was possible to be completely secular and to still make this inquiry into one’s true nature and he confirmed that of course it was. You don’t have to give any name to this permanent sense of self - you don’t have to call yourself spiritual.
Neither is it something that makes you different or better than anyone else - that would be just more ego - the ‘I” that wants to be ‘special and ‘Enlightened.’ Experientially, it is about being fully here in each moment as spacious awareness in human form and loving what is in front of you, without too much mind stuff getting in the way.
It’s just enjoying each second of life. If the mind does become noisy, you see it for what it is: a bunch of thoughts passing through that don’t really matter.
This realisation of who you are, brings great energy. When you are no longer attached to an identity or to a story – such as what happened in the past, or what might happen in future - then you can release any stress and worry that might be exhausting you. There is no self who feels threatened or who is trying to control an outcome. Or, as a former student of mine, Miriam puts it:
“When I had ME, I would worry when I had a relapse about how I would cope over the coming days and weeks. My memories of how ill I was in the past would colour my mind like a twisted prism, making me anxious and stressed, even though it was just a memory. The burden of holding onto that idea and the fear of how the illness would continue in the future affected me terribly and sucked all my vitality. I was seeing life as if it were something continuous and solid and always painful. I was also seeing life as something that I thought that I could control. Once I let go and just became more present and understood that the illness was not who I was, then there was a great release. Now I see everything in life as just a play of energy fluctuations.”
Your True Identity is Free and Unlimited
With this knowledge of who you really are, comes freedom. This realisation of your true identity engenders a great feeling of security as you realise that whatever happens, you remain the same.
From this, you may begin to see that your relationship with others is dependent on the relationship that you have with yourself. If you love life and who you are; if you are peaceful because you genuinely accept everything about yourself; then you will naturally love and reach out to everyone. You really know that the solution for happiness is always inside you and is not something that is external.
We are living in challenging times and the world needs more of us who can spread peace and unity. We can only help with this however when we have cultivated genuine peace for ourselves, so that nothing disturbs us. The micro reflects the macro. Then we can be a light unto the world.
When things that you may formerly have perceived as being ‘bad’ happen, you understand that this is just the nature of reality and that if you can accept things as they are, you are not creating a war inside yourself by limiting your thinking around an idea. Situations can come and go - but they are just like the weather systems and don’t disturb you, because you are the beginning-less, endless, ever-present, changeless space of the sky.