Watching a Separate Self Be Created

Photo courtesy & © Gary Crabbe / Enlightened Images; used with permission.

Now as you guys probably know, my awakening is occurring with many glimpses and whatnot. There’s a whole bunch of non-abiding awakenings. For a while my mind said it was b/c I kept doing something wrong.. yet I’m starting to see what a tremendous gift this is.

For example, in an post that forum member Lee started on Transparency, I shared how my sense of transparency was temporary. Lee has shared her abiding experience as well, and I invite you to check out her explanation too.

The cool thing about these repeated non-abiding awakenings is that without a sense of false self, I get to watch it try to be created again and again and see exactly how the “me” gets hooked right back into existence.

It’s literally getting watch creation happen right before my eyes.

It’s like watching a sports play on instant replay again and again and seeing what I missed the first couple of times.

Foundation

At the core (heh.. there is no core, there is no center, but I don’t know what other word to use…), there’s this vast emptiness. Literally nothingness. Just an infinite spaciousness.

Within the space, everything arises and everything passes. Everything exists in the nothingness, the same way that all form in physical reality is surrounded by space and even full of space.

Within nothingness, bodies appear, thoughts arise, and all temporary passings show up within the eternal silence.

Passing Thoughts

In the last experience of nothingness, it was noticed that thoughts arise, and they pass though just as easily with zero clinging. No stopping to examine the thought or look at it. It simply passed on out of consciousness as gently as it had entered, without any effort at all.

Just like driving down the street and seeing one of the zillions of things that pass your field of view, just as easily as it enters your field of view, it leaves, leaving no lasting impression.

Clinging Begins

The question “Who am I?” then arose in thought and some answers arose accordingly, and they all just passed through with some, but very little clinging, and they were quickly let go of when the clinging was recognized for what it is.

One answer which came up was, “I am no self. There is no self here. Nothing is here.”

The mind then took this idea of “no self” and made it into a something to identify with. At first this something was let go of and it passed right on through, just like everything else, except there was a temporary resistance in order to hold onto it as it passed through.

The Old I Returns

Then the thought arose again, “I am no self.” And an intimately familiar sense of “me’ness” came into consciousness. A sense of clumped density. Literally out of nothing, something was (re)created. It’s more of a feeling or presence than a thought at this point, but it started from the thought. “My energy” is what I am, as opposed to pure awareness and being, which is impersonal.

This sense of dense presence was let go of, but it gradually melted back again and out of habit and familiar comfort, identification with this sense of self returned.

The veil returned and a separate self was formed once again.

Noticing the Difference

Going through this again and again, it’s becoming vividly clear what the differences are between the false self and the true self. It’s more of a feeling than what can be described. As usual with this stuff, you just gotta experience it for yourself to know.

So what exactly is this false sense of self?

It is the concept “I” as something that can be defined, and anything that one would possess, such as “my” energy, my body, my thoughts, my consciousness, my opinions, or anything else that one can be in possession of.

For example, “the keys that are being held here” is a very different statement than “my keys.” You can even play the disassociation game to help make yourself more conscious of this difference.

The separate self is identification with something that arises within nothingness, including even the idea of nothingness, which is yet another subtle ego trick.

An idea is something. Nothing is not something. This is KEY!

No idea is what you are. Not one.