HOW CAN I GET THE CLARITY WITHIN MYSELF TO KNOW MYSELF?
When you ask yourself, “Who am I, and what should I be?” there is one phrase you must delete, and that is, “what should I be?” It would be a projection trying to reach somewhere, but how can you get somewhere when you are already there? That is why I always say that you are divine. You have nowhere to go at all. You come from nowhere and you go nowhere, for how can eternity, immortality, and infinity come from anywhere or go anywhere.
The better way to put it would be, “How can I gain clarity within myself to know myself?”
When you ask the question, “Who am I?” there is not a single person who would answer you. An outside source cannot answer it, but it can be answered by your inner self after gaining that clarity, after getting rid of the stumbling blocks. And you start slowly.
YOU ARE A MIXTURE OF YOUR INDIVIDUAL SELF AND YOUR UNIVERSAL SELF
In that wall that prevents you from seeing the other side, you just need to knock out one brick, and that force itself will knock away all the other bricks. It is like this boy in Holland, there was a hole in the dike, and he plugged it with his finger, or else the whole of Amsterdam would have been underwater. But here you do not need to plug the hole; you need to open that little hole, that one brick, so that the flood, the waters of Divinity, could cover your entirety. And then the bricks are of no value, the wall is gone. And that is what you want. When the wall has collapsed, all the little samskaras that constitute the wall will be submerged in the water of Divinity.
Then what would you say who you are? Will you say that I am the bricks lying under the water, or will you say that I am the water, the ocean? For what is the difference between the water, the ocean, and the bricks? There is no difference at all. It is just moving it around, breaking down the barrier so that the mud of the walls will mix in the water of Divinity, and they become one. And you cannot separate that mud from the water, or else it would not be mud. It would either be water or mud if you separate them. So, this mud is a mixture of your individual self with your Universal Self.
WHEN YOU START REALISING “I AM BRAHMA,” THEN THE QUESTION “WHO AM I?” DISAPPEARS
Therefore, everything is divine, and never ask the question, “Who am I?” For the answer is already there, I am that Divinity. I exist in that Divinity if any existence there be. For it is only the small I that thinks of existence, but the big I does not think of existence at all, because the big I cannot think. It just is. So, when we ask the question “who am I?” the answer is straightforward: “I am I. Yahweh. I Am That I Am,” without any qualifications at all: I am This, I am That.
The Vedas usually talk about “Thou art That,” and of course, it means that thou art Divinity. But why the Thou and the That? Do you see how mistaken it is? Because you are creating a separation between thou and that, where no thou and that exist. That is the grand illusion, and it is supposed to be one of the four great injunctions of the Vedas.
“Thou art That” is for the wayfarer who is on the path that slowly, slowly, slowly starts realising that you are divine. Which is a necessary step, but it is not the total answer. But when you say and start realising Brahmasmi – I am Brahma – then the question of “who am I” disappears entirely. Because to ask a question, there has to be a questioner. And who asks the question? The little mind wants to know who I am.
IN SELF-REALISATION NO QUESTION REMAINS
So, when there is no question, there needs to be no answer. You just are. Isness. Beingness in totality. When you are total, who is there outside to ask, “Who am I?” In that totality, there is no question left because there has to be someone outside to ask the question. And if there is no one outside in totality, then no question is asked and no answer is necessary, and that is what we call the realisation of self. That I realise myself means that I am myself, for the question disappears again. Who is the realiser? Realisation is self-existent. Like this one philosopher said, if I could stand outside the universe with a barge pole, I could turn it around. I cannot remember the guy’s name. He was perhaps poetic or perhaps just dwelling in his imagination. Because he can never be outside the universe, he can become the universe, ah, yes. You see, these philosophers have led us up the garden path. You can take all your Hegel and Kant and Spinoza and Nietzsche and whoever.
One day, the question “who am I?” will disappear from your mind because the basis of that question, “who am I?” stems from insecurity and inadequacy. It is only when you feel insecure that you want to know who you are or what you are. It is a stepping stone. Nothing is useless; everything has its own purpose. But reach the stage of purposeless purpose. Ahh! That is the stage. Purposeless purpose means non-motivation, non-questioning, non-inquiring. These are necessary.
The child goes to school, form two, three, four, five, six… ten, eleven, twelve. He needs to inquire. But when he has gone through all his studies, he does not need to ask any more. When the teacher gives a child in form one a maths lesson, and the child is made to write down two plus two equals four, minus one makes it three, and add two makes it five. The child has to write it so that the thought becomes stabilised in the child’s mind. But when you have reached a higher grade, you do not need to write it down at all. You do not need to; it is just there quickly in the mind: two and two is four, less one is three, plus two is five. You see, it is just there in the mind. But a child needs it. So, all these inquiries and practices are but preparations to become questionless. The most significant question is the question itself. So, when the most significant question becomes the question itself, then no question remains.
IN REALISATION THE QUESTING DISAPPEARS BECAUSE YOU HAVE NOW BECOME THE REAL I
As I have said, having the mind so dissected, you need an outer force. A portion of the mind asks a question. The conscious mind tries to approach higher levels of itself, or even the subconscious or the superconscious, to answer the question of the conscious mind. But when the conscious mind is not there, then who is going to do the asking or questioning? No one. The whole idea is not questioning but realising. And mark the word. When you ask, you are questioning. But when you realise – real I – the real I. Then questing disappears because you have now become the real I in your real-I-sation. Very simple. Peanuts.
… Gururaj Ananda Yogi: Satsang US 1985 – 27
