Mind & Happiness 91

Who am I ?

Only by attending to our own essential Consciousness, which we experience as "I", will we be able to distinguish between this Consciousness & all the objects known by it, including the Body & Mind that we now mistake to be "I".  By thus attending to our Consciousness & thereby distinguishing it from its contents, we can know for certain whether or not we can remain as mere Consciousness, entirely separate from our Body, our Mind & all its thoughts, feelings & perceptions.  

If we are able to do so, we will prove to our self that in essence we are only Consciousness, & that we are neither the Body nor the Mind that we now mistake to be "I".  Let us therefore now analyze our experience of our self thoroughly, examining how exactly we experience our self in each one of our 3 States of Consciousness, Waking, Dream, & Deep Dreamless Sleep, in order to obtain a clear theoretical understanding of what we are & what we are not.  By doing so, we will be able to verify for our self whether or not we can reasonably arrive at the hypothesis mentioned above.

When we analyze our experience of our self in our present Waking state, we can see that our knowledge of who or what we are is confused & unclear.  If we are asked, "Who are you?", we reply, "I am so & so".  This name is the name given to our Body, & we identify our self with this name because we take our Body to be "I".  We feel "I am sitting here, reading this book" because we identify our self with our Body.

This Sense of identification, "I am this Body", is so strong that it remains with us throughout our Waking State.  In fact, it is the basis of all that we experience in this Waking State.  Without first feeling this Body to be "I", & thereby limiting our self within its confines, we would not know or experience any of the things that we experience in this Waking State.

Not only is the external World known by us only through the 5 Senses of this Body, but even the thoughts & feelings that we experience within our Mind are felt by us to be occurring only within this Body. All our Perceptual, Emotional, Mental, & Intellectual Life in the Waking state is centered in this Body. All that we take our self to be, & all that we take to be ours, is centered in & around this Body.  For us this Body is not only the center of our Life, it is the center of the whole World that we perceive around us.

However, we identify our self not only with our Body, but also with our Mind, & though our Body & our Mind are obviously very closely connected, we speak of them as 2 different things. Since we simultaneously identify our self with 2 things that we take to be different, is it not clear that in our present Waking State our knowledge of who or what we actually are is confused & uncertain ?

The above themes & 2500 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through  www.jpstiga.com 

short-cut: http://sdrv.ms/YPOgkX or http://tinyurl.com/nnyyr58  link directly to free E-book PDF files

www.jpstiga.com/

http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/

Different blogs available on:

jstiga.wordpress.com/

"There is no Creation, no Destruction, no Bondage, no longing to be freed from Bondage, no striving for Liberation, nor anyone who has attained Liberation. Know that this to be Ultimate Truth."

–  the "no creation" school of Gaudapada, Shankara, Ramana, Nome – Ajata Vada

 for very succinct summary of the teaching & practice, see:  www.ajatavada.com/

[A brief note of explanation – the other Blog noted below is entitled "Non-Duality & Science", & so the more Science oriented pages (from what I like to think of as a "comic book") have been posted there, while other chapters have been posted here. Science is a mental discipline that attracts some worthy admirers & participators.  Some of these, too few, are good prospects for the ancient teaching introduced here in many ways.  Otherwise certain Science topics like the Anthropic Principle, reinforce the general Theism which is a good idea in this materialistic age. A few other topics in Science, such as the Copenhagen II – Max Born – Von Neumann – Wigner model of Quantum Mechanics, are worthy entries to the extent that they introduce Consciousness into the physical Sciences. All that aside, the real topic here is the pinnacle as Advaita Vedanta, Non-Duality – that pinnacle being Ajata Vada, No–Creation. The great Teachers of the same include Sri Shankara & Sri Ramana Maharshi.  Both would support Theism in general & adaptations of Vedanta, such as Vishishtadvaita Vedanta – Qualified Non-Duality, for those not making headway in Ajata Vada, their present course of growth might be better served with a temporary involvement in Qualified Non-Duality. The scientist who perhaps best expresses the influence of Qualified Non-Duality in Science, for instance, would be the quintessential "New–Age" Quantum Physicist, Amit Goswami. And so to that source, & the Quantum Activism he currently advocates [with a 1–course  degree program], along with more than a half-dozen good books & former participation in the controversial What the Bleep movie, to him I extend enthusiastic endorsement, for that Qualified Non-Duality described in the context of Science.  I do not stand so much "with him", as much as nearby saluting his good work. Again, as here, the goal is inserting Consciousness into Science & "saving the World."]

also:  Most of this material will be long searchable via "John Stiga" etc, on the "Wayback Machine" Internet Archive.

Also related to these topics, there are now 8 Kindle books on "Amazon.com", reference-able by the author "John Stiga", each indicated as non–copyrighted, public–domain, & priced at the minimum $0.99 each.