You Are, You Exist
You are. These are the truest words you will ever read. The fact is indisputable. But what are you? A brain with a body? Yes. But is there more? Yes. Underlying your body-mind is that which allows the body-mind to function, to live. It is conciousness. Not the conciousness that wakes up in the morning and says "coffee, now", but that which allows the mind to think "coffee, now". This underlying entity may be called a soul, or awareness, or conciousness, among others, but they all refer to the same thing. It is the awareness that knows it exists. One way to catch a glimpse of this awareness is to say to yourself, "I exist." Though similar to the statement "I am.", "I exist." carries more specific information, yet remains a simple fact, devoid of emotion. It is the simplest and truest and possibly the only truth that you can know. Say or think the words "I exist", and try to remove all other thought and distraction from your mind. As you think about the fact that you exist, you may wonder how it might feel if you didn't exist. You cannot know how that feels because as a part of all conciousness, you have always existed. As you ponder the two words, you may actually begin to feel your existence, and know your existence, and the words, man-made as they are, will drop away. When you feel your own being, stripped of all human-ness, you will know that you always have been and will always be, though not in human form. When you begin to feel and know the essence of your being, all negativity, which is rooted in fear, will be lifted, and faint, yet unmistakable peace will come over you. You may catch inklings that you are not so much a product of creation but part of creation. There will be fuzzy realizations, similar to dream rememberances, of things you know to be true but beyond the capability of your brain to translate into words or thought. You will know that you know things but you won't know what they are. You can only feel them, be them, and there will be excitement about them because they are positive. Say the words "I exist" often, especially when earthly stresses and fears begin to dominate your thoughts. The words, factual as they are, devoid of emotion, are by default positive. They illicit feelings from the root of all joy, the joy of existence. And in this joy you may feel the joy and gratitude that comes not from knowing you were born, but from knowing that you are, that you are aware, that you exist. What you are is irrelevant. That you are is the important thing. And now for what you are not, as in your job, your wealth, your toys, your accomplishments, your beauty, your house, your car, your awards, your career, your education, your name, your status, your pride, your race, your country, nor as Deepak chopra says are you inferior to anyone or superior to anyone. Of course these things are not you, right? You don't define yourself through things or activities do you? Because if you do, it means that once you give those things or activities up, you will be less than you are with them. Is that true? If you lose your prestigious job or your prized posession would you somehow be diminished as a person? In the eyes of your ego, and the egos of others, yes. And so, because over the course of a life, we mistakenly become identified with things that will eventually fade, we program ourselves for unhappiness. Is this to say we should not acquire toys or train for high level jobs? Absolutely not! By all means, fulfill your dreams, get your dream toys, do the dream things, but know that it is all for your own satisfaction, not for the approval of others. And know that these things you have and do are simply that--things you have and do. They are not you. To consider yourself superior to others because of what you have and do is to be owned by things that one day will find you no longer worthy of them. Yes, enjoy the goodies the world has to offer, but don't seek peace and happiness through them. Seek human enjoyment and self satisfaction with no thought to compare with others. Your ego will attempt to categorize and compare your acquisitions and accomplishments with those of others, making you smaller than others with your lesser feats, and larger than others with your grander ones. But there is no true peace or happiness in comparing yourself to others. Yes there may be a trophy or a medal or other award, but the happiness of winning comes from within. It is the happiness of knowing that you performed with the very highest quality, not that you kicked so-and-so's rear end. Try comparing yourself to the creation of a book and its main parts as it is manifest. First there is the idea or vision for the book. This compares to your unmanifested spirit. There is a front and back cover, a spine, and the pages. These compare to your body and mind. And there is the story as written on the pages. The story is like the content, or what happens in your life. Once the idea is created, it now exists. It exists in the realm of possibilities, even before it is manifest in the physical as a book. Take away the physical book and the content, and what is left? The idea, the spirit, remains. You are the space in which the body and content come to be. Another analogy is to imagine that the totality of your existence is comprised of three energies. The most important is the awareness or soul energy who is the observer of the body mind as it goes through life in the physical. The body mind is the second energy, and the third energy is the content of your life, or what happens to you as you go through life. This example will show you that what happens in your life, though important and serious as it may seem, is not the same as the body mind, nor is it the same as the soul. It is not really that serious. Because you will realize that you are separate from the content of your life, what happens in your life will have a space around it that will prevent self-induced mental suffering that all humans allow and sometimes crave, that serve to diminish your human experience: Let's equate the three energies, the awareness, the body mind and the content of life to a person watching TV. There is the person watching the TV, (your spirit who observes your body mind going through life), there is the TV, (the body mind who goes through life), and there is the TV show, (the content of your life, or what happens). If the TV is turned off, the TV still exists, so we realize that the show is not the TV, and the content of your life, is not your body mind. You are not what happens to you, and there is space between your body and your life experience. Take it a step further, and even more space is created around the content of your life by equating the person watching the TV to the TV. Take away the TV and the watcher still exists--They are not the same, and so now we realize that the spirit that observes the body mind (person watching TV) is not the body mind, (the TV watcher is not the TV), and neither is the spirit the same as the content of life (the person watching the TV is not the same as show on the TV). And so what you get are two layers of separation between the real you, the spirit, and what happens in your life. Since you are not what happens in your life, there is space around what happens, and so there is less worry, less stress, less negativity generated by the little and even big things that happen in your life. You are not what happens, and so what happens is not quite as important as it once was. If you are not what happens to you, and not the things you have and do then what are you? You simply exist. All the happiness and peace and joy you could ever want are waiting in the honest truth of your existence. Uncovering this peace and happiness is an inside job and is possible no matter what the outcomes of your worldly pursuits. Once you know this you will be free.
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