Feeling I am?

[Spiritualseeker]

Namaste,

I have been reading a work that has Question and answers by Sri Ramana Maharshi and I have also been reading question and answers with Mooji. I notice that a lot of times Mooji and Ramana will tell students to feel the 'I' or feel the 'I am'. They talk a lot about feeling that you exist. So there is a tracing of the 'I am' back from body, mind, and then to seeing that 'I am' is unassociated. The perceived problem on my end is that these words have only piled up as concepts in my mind and they are burdensome. I feel that the feeling of being existence or being alive can be felt when focused on the inner body. The aliveness within...is this the same thing that they mean when they say to feel your existence or to know that you exist ? I hope my question is clear.

Om Namah Shivaya

[Kismet]

Namaste, SpiritualSeeker

I'm curious about something. Observe this Kaniza figure:



A lot of people nowadays would doubt the existence of a self, based on the fact that it is an "illusion" foisted on us by our thought processes. Just as in the center of the figure above you can't help but make out an invisible triangle, so too we "cannot help" make out the existence of an apparent self or ego, even though it doesn't really exist.

I'm assuming this is not quite what Ramana or Mooji mean when they are talking about "feeling the self" but I'm curious what you think about all this, and hopefully it has some bearing on your question as well insofar as I understand it.

[Kismet]

The aliveness within...is this the same thing that they mean when they say to feel your existence or to know that you exist ? I hope my question is clear.

Om Namah Shivaya

That is essentially what I've thought as well. The ALIVENESS, not the thought. The SELF, not the ego.

[proudhindu]

Not quite getting what is the teaching of Mooji.

Why would anybody needs to be told that he is indeed alive?; under normal circumstances.

that part about being unassociated is also not clear.unassociated with what?.

[Kismet]

Not quite getting what is the teaching of Mooji.

Why would anybody needs to be told that he is indeed alive?; under normal circumstances.

that part about being unassociated is also not clear.unassociated with what?.

I think what Spiritualseeker meant by feeling that one is "alive" is not just like, checking your pulse or knowing that you aren't dead... It's more like introspectively getting to know your real essence or "being."

You know some days when you feel more "alive" than on others when you're drowsy or depressed? Well, I think that is precisely what he's getting at. This energy of feeling alive is always there within us, untapped as it were.

[Spiritualseeker]

Namaste,

Thanks kismet thats what I feel they are trying to convey. It is presence. Unassociated is in terms of tracing the "I" thought back to its root. Is it the body? The body is observable. This cannot be it (Not this). Perhaps the mind? What is mind? Thoughts arise and disappear... Is this me? If I am not the mind or body who am I? Mind cannot answer in a way that is pleasing. The mind will always construct a lump of concepts. It will miss the mark. So when feeling I am... it is really just existence that is not attached to outward arisings. Its not identified with thoughts (mind) nor the body (which is another aspect of the mind in which a thought is that 'I' am this body).

Om Namah Shivaya

[saidevo]

namaste everyone.

Some offhand thinking on the OP by Spiritualseeker: members might correct me where I am wrong or elaborate on these ideas.

• 'I am' throws up the question 'I am what?'
• 'I' throws up the question 'I who?'

From the angle of comtemplation,

• 'I am who?' seems more remote than 'I am what?' because as a novice seeker it is difficult for me to believe that 'I am not who I am', that is, 'I am someone else', although it might well be the case that 'I am not who I think I am'.

• 'I am what?' is more convenient because I readily associate myself, sometimes with my body, more usually with my mind and rarely with the beyond.

• This association becomes more and more meaningful and spiritual, if and when I can think and say, 'I am happiness' rather than 'I am happy', 'I am peace' rather than 'I am peaceful' and 'I am existence' rather than 'I am alive'. It is more meaningful and spiritual because of the distinction between knowledge and feeling. For example, 'I am happiness' is knowledge, whereas 'I am happy' is only a feeling.

• So, what is the question I should pursue: 'Who am I?' (as the subject behind) or 'What am I' (what causes the feeling of I in me)?

• I think both these questions complement each other. With the first, I seek the knower in me. With the second, the known.

• With sufficient progress, I should find, as the shRuti says, that I am neither the knower nor the known but only pure knowledge--jnAnam, which is nothing but consciousness, another name for Brahman.

• I know that I should take the shRuti statements as my goal and progress. And I have a clue: whatever I can associate with as 'my/mine' is not I, the subject. So, by a process of neti neti I can rule out my body, mind and intellect as the subject that is I, but still the feeling 'my soul'--AtmA, persists.

Is the I-consciousness in me caused by 'my soul'? If not, how I do get past beyond this Atma-granthi--knot of the (individual) soul?

[sunyata07]

Lovely post, Saidevo. You've hit the mark with those questions, separating knowledge from feeling. Why oppose them when they can serve to help each other with this question of identifying what you really are?

• With sufficient progress, I should find, as the shRuti says, that I am neither the knower nor the known but only pure knowledge--jnAnam, which is nothing but consciousness, another name for Brahman.

Yes, exactly. One comes to know Tat Tvam Asi - You are That.

Om namah Shivaya

[Spiritualseeker]

Namaste,

Saidevo beautiful post. This seems to sum it all up for us. Such deep wisdom that pours out of ancient scriptures, yet this wisdom is even more ancient and timeless than that. OM

Yes, exactly. One comes to know Tat Tvam Asi - You are That.

Om namah Shivaya

Tat Tvam Asi OM, how wonderful this is. Life is not as cruel as sometimes we think it. It is a beautiful reflection of the Supreme.

Om Namah Shivaya

[Eastern Mind]

Vannakkam SS et al: Yes, I see it as that one step deeper. My teacher termed it this way. "You are aware, but are you aware of being aware?" So the goal is to watch the mind think. This brings inner meaning, and perhaps more importantly, self-control.
So rather than just the feeling of, "I'm grumpy, I'm angry, I'm happy" its "Currently my awareness is travelling in the areas of mind called grumpiness, anger, or happiness." This thinking then can lead to a conscious control of where we ( meaning awareness) go.

Same concept in slightly different light.

Aum Namasivaya