You Are Not Your Mind

What are you?

It’s a simple question.

Chances are, if you’re reading this article, you’re human. (To all you aliens and humanoids out there reading this article, hello! This will apply to you too!)

So, for the sake of argument, let’s say you’re a human being. If someone were to point to you, they would be pointing to your body, as if the body was you. When you see the body of your friend “Bob” approaching, you’ll probably say hello to the “body” of Bob, as if he was his body.

If Bob gets his arms and legs chopped off, is he still Bob? Indeed he is. The same applies to you. You could even get your head cut off, and you’d still be you. YOU wouldn’t disappear.

So, you must not be your body.

Ah, you must then be the mind inside the body, right? That makes more sense. Afterall, that’s where your personality lies, your thoughts, opinions, belief systems, memories… Sure your body is certainly one of a kind, but most everything important that makes you unique lies inside your mind, yes?

You know that little voice inside your head? … If you just said to yourself, “What little voice?”, THAT’S the little voice!

Go and and tell yourself to stop thinking. Do it. Stop thinking.

…

Can’t do it, can you?

The reason why is because your thoughts are NOT YOU. The thoughts automatically come and go on their own, without any conscious control, much like your breath.

And, like your breath, your mind can influence itself to try and think a certain thought, at least temporarily, but ultimately you do not have any control over your mind.

Have you ever heard someone say, “My mind is driving me crazy!”

Who was it that was being driven crazy by the thoughts? Were the thoughts themselves crying out, “Help! Help! Help!” No, it is the experiencer BEHIND the thoughts who is aware of the thoughts continuously rising and falling. That is who is being driven crazy, suppressed.

Believe it or not, your mind is actually 99% SILENT. It’s the 1% of the thoughts which take up your entire field of attention.

It’s the silence behind the mind which allows the thoughts of the mind to stand out. If the mind was filled with pure noise, you wouldn’t be able to even hear your own thoughts.

A movie screen needs to be totally blank in order for the watcher to see the movie. If there was random junk all over the movie screen, you couldn’t make out the movie.

A room needs to be empty in order for two people to see one another. If the room was completely filled with cardboard boxes, you couldn’t see anyone else.

The reason you can hear a bird chirping in the forest is because of the infinite silence of the forest.

It is the silence behind the form which allows form to exist, that is, to stand apart from.

Your thoughts rise and fall continuously, like the waves of the ocean. One after another, they come and go.

Your thoughts are like the actors in a film. When you’re watching a movie, you know you’re not the movie, but you tend to “sucked in” to the movie. The emotions the characters experience, you experience, even though they’re not your emotions. It’s very easy to identify with that which you are not. The ego designed to do this, by nature.

It does such a great job, that it deserves an academy award. Its performance feels SO real. Its emotions feel like your own. THAT is good acting!

Behind the ego and behind thoughts is the silent witness, the watcher of the movie. You can “zoom out” and watch your mind as the unattached observer, as if you were simply watching a movie.

Sit down quietly for a minute, close your eyes, and watch your thoughts without any judgment or labeling. Do not identify with the thoughts, as the thinker. Be the watcher of the thoughts. If you catch yourself identifying with the thoughts as “me”, that’s okay. Just bring yourself back to watching the thoughts.

Go ahead and begin watching your thoughts.

…

As you watched the thoughts, what did you notice? Perhaps you saw the mind jumping from thought to thought, perhaps staying on one category or jumping to something else entirely. Perhaps a little tune popped into the mind. Perhaps the mind thought of something that happened in the past, or something that may happen in the future. Perhaps the mind thought of something else that needs to be done later on today.

Whatever.

It’s all just mental gobbledygook. None of it is you. You are that which witnesses thoughts.

The thoughts are not you. In fact, they’re not even YOUR thoughts. Your body is not you. It is not even YOUR body.

Yes, the ego would like to take credit for thoughts. Yes it would like to claim ownership to the body.

The body you are currently using is simply a tool, a gift you’re given with which to experience this world. The body belongs to existence. The body you are currently using is no more yours than a tree in a forest or the air which is currently in your lungs. Yes you are temporarily using the air, but soon you will let it go.

Your body is guided by your spirit. It is moving and flowing with the universe, just like the water in a river. The ego, on the other hand, attempts to claim authorship for everything the body and mind does.

Have you ever had an experience when an idea just suddenly came to you out of nowhere? Almost as if it was a divine thought, an inspired thought. It just “popped” into you. It came from God himself, yet the ego immediately will jump in and attempt to claim it as “my” thought.

Silly ego…

So, who are you?

“Who am I?” is actually the wrong question to ask. It’s attempting to personify, to make human, that which is not human. God is not human.

A more accurate question would be, “What am I?”

You are that which is witnessing AND that which is being witnessed.

You are the Alpha and the Omega.

You are the high and the low. The hot and the cold. The loving and the unloving. The good and the bad. The manifest and the unmanifest. The form and the formless.

In Truth, there is no duality. It is all one. It is all continuous. The duality only exists in the mind, in your imagination.

You are All That Is. You are All that is Not. All that is Not is necessary to experience All That Is, even though it does not exist.

You are the essence of life, the same essence which is in everyone.

You are the bum on the street, the millionaire in the jet, the Jew, the Christian, the Muslim, the athiest, the camel, the yo-yo, the sun, the moon, the infinite emptiness of space, and all form that exists in space.

You are everything.

We are all one.