HUNTING THE I

Successful Self-Inquiry

Ed Muzika

Old Home

Practice

Resources

Philosophy

Question and Answers

Contact

Robert

“Correct practice" of self-inquiry is so important that I feel a need to articulate its many different ways, because the "successful" methods are subtle indeed. One can practice unsuccessful self-inquiry for a long time because you have no idea of what you are looking for. Therefore, I will explain the various methods in a slightly different ways hoping that one way or another will connect with those truly interested in practice.

Some people are able to feel a sense of I Am almost immediately upon introspection and others not. One is by nature naturally introspective or not. To do self-inquiry, one either has the talent or learns it by practice. The same holds true for psychotherapy. Those who are able to look within and "see" internal, imaginal objects will do well in talk therapy, while those who lack this skill, will not. However, one can learn this skill through repeated efforts to "look within" the imaginal spaces of the mind.

The problem is, a lot of people do not experience an ‘I am’ feeling or sensation and therefore have nothing to work with. They look “inside themselves” and find only darkness, or they find a myriad of phenomena, such as inner light displays, thoughts, images, memories, body sensations, arising energies, etc., and don’t have a clue as to which is the ‘I Am’ that is to be concentrated on. They are lost in a forest of sensations and perceptions and have no sense of I or ‘I am’.

If this is the case, Robert offered the method of asking, “Who am I?,” or “To whom do these thoughts and objects occur?” This method CAN eventually lead you to the witness, but the weakness is that this method is totally on the level of the mind and thinking, and one has to go beyond the mind.

The other weakness of the “Who am I?” method is that after you learn how to find and witness a thought—any thought, including the I-thought—watching where it comes and goes from, leads to the Void. All thoughts come and go from the Void. Try it. Each person experiences the appearance of thoughts differently, but whatever their form, they arise spontaneously from the emptiness background/foreground and disappear there too. This is not made clear though until the inner world is “opened” enough to see inner space itself as a phenomena.

While thus looking into the Void as the source and destination of thoughts, one can attempt to become the void, thinking it must be the self, since that’s where thoughts arise and disappear, or one can continue to peer into the void, still looking for the source. However, the real point of looking for the source is to find the watcher of the thought, the subject, the seeker, the looker, and then become the looker. The subject, I, the looker, is not the Void. The Void too is an object for the looker. This is the great error of seeking the source of thoughts because one can think to continue to look into the void where thoughts appear to arise or fall, or one can look for that which perceives the thought, including the I-thought. I know well of this trap because I fell in it for years.

Thus self-inquiry has two steps: Take a look at all phenomena available to you, both inside phenomena such as thoughts and images, and outside phenomena, such as objects in the world, both while meditating and throughout the day; observe them and “play” with the phenomena. Get familiar with and explore the inner world to an extent. Then ask yourself, “Is that phenomena me, or am I apart from it?” You are really searching for that core feeling that one would associate with the assertion, “This is me.”

What we are attempting to do is find the anomaly, that which does not change, and is different from all other sensations in the sense that it is not an observed phenomena, but is in fact the observer, witness, or “looker” itself. It is the singularity around which all the objects and world are arranged.

There are many phenomena that appear to be ‘I Am’ to the inquirer at various times, such as the I thought, or ego, or the great Void which is experienced when you are close to awakening[1]. Many people also find several subjects, or “watchers.” One watches thoughts as a witness, and then one becomes aware that they are watching thoughts. That is, there are two orders of witnesses.

Mostly when people first think they experience the ‘I am’ sensation, they are really observing the energy knot that connects the body to the mind. They are not yet aware that they are apart from this phenomena, and are observing it, and that this observer is the real I. The observer or looker, or witness is so close to oneself that we often overlook it, as the Advaitic parable of the Tenth Indian points out. Often the

observer is not counted because it is not an object and is taken for granted and not found.

All these false Is have to be witnessed, explored and played with, and discovered not to be the true I. But the ‘I Am’ sensation Maharaj talks about is the ego knot connecting the body with consciousness. This knot is not you, but you have to discover that for yourself as a direct experience and not merely as a learning from others. Once this knot is severed, everything else is plain and clear, and it is severed through continuous observation, and one discovers that that knot is being observed by the imperishable Me. One day you awaken, and that day you find the knot is not there! What a discovery! At that point you identify with the totality of consciousness, with the totality of I Am. This is the first awakening, but certainly not the most important.

Self-inquiry is a continuous, full-time job, not restricted to formal meditation periods. Formal meditation, practiced often, is a big help as it builds introspective power. Of course, too much meditation makes the mind sluggish and stupid, which is an error.

Formal meditation period ought to be at least two periods a day, with two 25-35 minute sessions, separated by a five minute rest. This can be gradually increased for those who have the time to three or four sessions, of three 25-35 minute periods. I have found that periods substantially longer than 35 minutes are generally a waste of time, which is better used in shorter, more intense sittings.

However, the beneficial effects of building introspective power during meditation will be dissipated if the rest of the day is spent devoted to serving the world. Once one has isolated what they think to be their ‘I Am”, the student needs to stop several times during the day for a few minutes, and look at that ‘I am’ to better understand it during everyday life. The self-awareness should become continuous.

One will discover the ‘I am’ changes over time, because the real I is not being seen; it is only an object posing as the I.

Then one day one discovers the anomaly, that which never changes, which is the subject of all the myriads of the objects. Once that is clearly seen, all objects lose importance, and the seeker’s “job” is to stay in, or abide in that observer, that subject, that witness, from whom all the objects of the world arise. This is a resting state. Trying to stay in that center is not really an effort. What happens is the restless mind which we identify with needs to be active, and because of that identification with the mind, “we” get active. However, the real I is always resting, and by continuously bringing the mind’s attention to the looker or witness, it loses interest in going elsewhere due to the deep peace felt in the resting state.

Once the witness is discovered, one has a broad road to follow to self-realization. The false I’s fall away or are dissipated. Then one’s full time job is to stay in that I, abide there, and infinite peace and happiness will fall, which will draw you effortlessly into itself all the way.

How this is to be done is explained below.

Before we go into more detail about the process, we need to be clear that we can and should perform the same analysis with respect to objects in the external world. Choose an object, such as a person, a tree, a pet sitting by a window. Observe it and at the same time look into oneself for the sense of ‘I Am’ and see if one feels a connection between the I am and that object. If the object is emotionally charged, such as a loved one, there will often be felt a connection between that person and the heart. When one discovers that heart source, one can deliberately try sinking into it. This will cause an immediate increase in happiness and centeredness that will help formal meditation and lead more quickly to freedom. Then one needs to observe whether that heart source is the witness or not.

Hopefully this overview explains the whole process, and now the process will be explained in more detail.

First, the best descriptions of self-inquiry found elsewhere are in two books: The Path of Sri Ramana, Part 1 by Sadhu Om and Michael James, chapters seven and eight, and the Nisargadatta Gita by Pradeep Apte. The latter is a compilation by Apte of about 230 paragraphs Nisargadatta uttered about the I Am sense and self-abidance. The Path of Sri Ramana description is more like what Robert Adams taught.

The way of self-discovery taught by Robert, Ramana and Nisargadatta is to abide in the I Am, but what does this mean? What is the I Am? How do I abide in it? How do I practice self- inquiry?

Further discussion of the practice of self-remembering, or self- abidance can be found in James' book, “Happiness and the Art of Being,” especially the latter chapters.

One other book I sometimes recommend for those who do not experience a sense of I Am, the sense of existence or presence, is that by Michael Langford, “The most rapid and Direct Means to Eternal Bliss.”

Michael writes that he practiced various self-concepts of self- inquiry for 27 years with poor results. He was no more self- realized than when he started.

I want his experience make one thing clear, self-inquiry is complex because there are so many inner experiences and finding the subject, which then is rested in, can be quite difficult. It certainly is not a simplistic tool like using the “Who Am I?” question over and over again. Michael assiduously practiced self inquiry for 27 years, read all the books, visited all the teachers, yet had not gotten anywhere. I can say the same about myself for over 20 years.

Nor is awakening merely finding out that there is no ego, and no object that the I thought refers to. These are still initial awakening experiences.

Michael never was able to latch onto a feeling ‘I Am’. He described a method and concept that being aware of awareness itself is abiding in the I Am; the method he discovered, or I should say he rediscovered, appears to be a Soto Zen meditation called Shikantaza. He may deny his method is Shikantaza because he believes he discovered awareness watching awareness method of self-inquiry, but his method is no more or

less than Shikantaza, sitting in silence, doing nothing except being aware. This is not easy. It takes a while. The mind has to settle and become quiet. Often years have to pass before this quiet sitting is possible, because beginners invariably expect immediate results. If they don't get them, they often give up or go to the next teacher or technique. Beginners don't like quiet, they want action.

However, as Robert often said, "Persistence is everything."

One other main self-inquiry method is to tease out the real 'I Am' feeling and abide there. This is generally not easy either depending on many factors. Personally, I think this is the best way and I will discuss it some more.

If one practices Shikantaza first, and attains many, many samadhis over a long period, one gradually finds release. However, the practice must continue because the I Am has not been killed. The I Am still resides as a remnant of the personal you. The samad his become like special walled off states, and one wonders which is the real, the samadhi states of oneness, or the waking/dream self that one always returns to. They are walled off in the sense that no matter how many samadhis one experiences, the same sense of human, body-bound beingness always returns afterwards.

The fastest way to kill the you, the I Am, is the abiding in the I Am as taught by Ramana and Nisargadatta. When this is done, the I dies forever; with Shikantaza there is a too early identification with the totality of consciousness and the Void, rather than cutting the knot, which is the energy nexus between the mind and body, and between that nexus and deeper levels of being, such as the causal body experiences of true nothingness.

If release is found by the first method (Shikantaza/Langford), for it to become a permanent release, the I Am must be found again

and followed. This is extremely difficult if one has dwelt in emptiness for years. It is hard then to find a self-sense for one has usually identified with emptiness through repeated Shikantaza meditations.

Many people have written to me they were unable to find a personal sense of I even after years of thinking and meditation. Many have dwelled in emptiness for years and begin to feel angry because they have found no happiness or release. They have skipped the destruction of the I Am process/complex which means it is still alive but unfelt, covered by the focus on emptiness. They have become lost in emptiness and attained nothing.

You cannot skip steps. It is best to start with the following the I Am and complete that task. Then abiding in the emptiness of the divine witness, the absolute, is effortless and permanent.

I once saw a book entitled “Hunting the I.” This to me is a perfect description of the self-inquiry process, hunting around in the internal phenomena that comprise our inner world, identifying the I, then latching onto that first-person sense.

This becomes complex because there is the 'I word' or 'I thought,' which is the central lynch pin of the network of thoughts and images we take to be the real world. This I-thought is not the same as the sense of one's personal existence, the 'I Am' sense which is much like a tactile sense associated with the body, and mostly centered around the heart, or sitting like some emptiness existing behind the body, or above the body.

Naturally to be aware of this already requires a good working ability to internalize and introspect subjective phenomena. This means either one has an innate ability, or one acquires this discrimination through years of practice.

I, being kind of dense, required years of practice. I was always introspective in a sense, easily lost in an inner world of thoughts and emotions, but that inner world was never open and spacious. I learned to open that inner, dark, subjectivity through opening the Third Eye by becoming aware of a light between the eyebrows and ever expanding that light downwards into the earth and then upwards and outwards, revealing an imaginal space filled with light, the so-called light of consciousness. But the problem was I spent years there in that lighted void space, thinking it was reality, not recognizing I was still separate and witnessing the void. I was far beyond the void, but was caught in ignorance. I was waiting to find the absolute sense of subjectivity by continuing to look into the Void.

During years of self-investigation, one will find legions of internal experiences which one might misidentify as I Am. Practice and persistence, as well as limiting oneself to reading just a very few books and listening to the guidance of a teacher is the best and fastest way out of this internal jungle.

Is practice necessary for self-realization? Definitely; yes, most definitely.

This is where the concept of hunting the I becomes a workable method.

One looks within to find the I Am. Every few days, weeks or months one discovers something new that they believe might be the “true” I Am: the subject.

Sometimes it is the self-luminous light of consciousness, sometimes illuminated space-like internal emptiness, sometimes it will be a feeling wholly based on the body sense. Some will feel that the sense of I Am as a sensation in the heart area of the self-perception of the feeling of the body. Others believe that they are aware of the body as an internal visual sense which is really an object in imaginal space and thus unreal. They will discover the inner sense of infinite (or non-infinite, limited) inner space and think they are that. They are not that.

One keeps exploring with the mistaken idea that at some point the I will be found, without realizing it is the I that is looking. The subject is not to be found, because the subject can never become an object. What one discovers is that all that one sees, experiences and knows is really an object experienced or known by the subject, which cannot be found.

This search can go on fruitlessly for years, for the self is not a thing, object, state, energy or anything that can be found or experienced. You may already understand this.

What to do?

At this point you must become aware that there is something that is aware of the self-inquiry processes. That “something” is the Self or the ultimate observer.

Then the “new” practice becomes looking at the looker, not at some body sensation or false I in imaginal space. You are already aware of the looker, but not that the looker is the true you. You have been caught in the misunderstanding that the looker may find the true self, when in fact, the looker is the true self. The looking "for" is the problem; the looker is already complete and at rest.

Therefore, join the looker.

So there are two steps: locate the looker, as the subject of sensations, and try to play with it to observe all its manifestations, then to rest in the looker, relax and let the looker look, and become the looker only.

When this is understood you have a clear way to abide in the self: just look towards the apparently internal sense of looking, not for a nexus, or an emptiness, or a heart sensation or any other sensation or experience. These are preliminary practices and steps before you discover the Looker. Then after discovery, sink into the looker, the subject and become the subject.

This sounds simple, but in fact the inner world is so filled with thoughts, objects, states, experiences, voids, emptiness, energies, and beingnesses, that clearly locating the "looker" is not all that easy. Just read the Autobiography of a Jnani, and you can see how intricate the internal experiences are, and how difficult it is to find the fundamental state.

You need to understand that what you will find is all that you had considered yourself to be, is not you, the looker, but objects, processes, thoughts and energies that you had previously taken as being you.

In a way, initially the looker often feels like just another sensation, another internal object; but it is not a physical sensation as is awareness of a body sensation or awareness of a thought.

The practice is to turn inwards towards the source, the looker, and look for it.

The process of locating phenomena, examining them and playing with them until you know them fully, and then eliminating them as the looker can be longer or shorter. This is the true self- inquiry process, not the one often referred to as mindlessly repeating, "Who am I?"

I have no idea of what you will experience; it appears different with different people.

But ultimately you will understand (see, experience, apprehend, discover, know) that there is no looking inside or outside. There is just one consciousness. The intentional effort of looking within was to counterbalance a lifelong habit of looking outwards and to develop introspective discrimination to eliminate internal and external objects and phenomena as the true you.

I want to emphasize that the phrase "look inward" is a lie. There is no inward--or outward. This distinction only lasts while you think you are a body. The phase "look inwards" almost sounds like a command to look into the inner emptiness of imagination, as inside the body. It is a bad instruction. It reinforces the idea of the reality of inner and outer, inside the skin and outside.

The world, your inner state, your searching, your imagination about what self-realization is like, will all disappear and you will understand that everything you have experienced until that moment is imagination. You will be free of all concept and imagination. In this you must abide for a long while, but self- abidance itself does not become continuous for a long time. It is a matter of persistence alone, and that only arises after a sustaining passion for truth becomes the most important issue to you.

Then, at some point, “everything” will disappear as unreal and you will be left in silent mind existence. It is hard to explain this, but this does not disappear as if you floated in endless aware space, but rather the world will cease to exist as an apparent object. The I will disappear as an apparent subject too. There will only be oneness with no separate observer of the world or self.

Later even that will disappear as one realizes there has been witnessing even of this whole process in the background. There is this thingless "thing" that has cognized this entire process, has cognized the body, personal self, the world, the waking state, the dream state, and also the process of understanding.

Regarding this “state” one can say nothing because no attributes exist, and to state attributes or what it is like will lead you astray form the real practice. This is not a state; it is that which observes all the states.

Now, this is one way of explaining the awakening process. Michael Langford articulated his way, and both Robert and Ramana articulated their methods. Notice that Robert, Ramana and Nisargadatta rarely talked about the “experience” of finality, only the method and Advaita philosophy that entirely obscures the goal by adding a conceptual impediment.

Ditto Langford and every other teacher. They provided only distracting phenomenology and philosophy, artificial stories to lead you to their articulation of a method and your practicing it.

I do not want to lead you too far astray, but all these methods are what I called before, “massaging the ego,” and themselves have nothing to do with the finality, yet to apparently practice is a must for all, even for those who claim no method or practice is possible or needed. It is needed to increase discrimination.

I do want to repeat that repeated bringing attention to the I Am, to the apparent subject, is a doing only as long as the I Am is taken as an object of meditation, such as when focusing on the ego knot connecting body and mind which most people take as the ‘I Am’. However, the real subject, the I, is not an object. It is YOU, the observer, beyond all phenomena and the world, and is a state of not doing anything, just watching. It is the resting

state of being. The apparent doing of bringing the mind to bear on the I, really is a supplication of grace, for the I will take over and end the seeker’s seeking. The I is the zero point of no movement and eternal rest. The apparent activity involved in abiding in that I, is really a resting, not a doing. It is discovering your nondoing, resting self.

Abiding in the I am, is really a practice in doing nothing, but it is successful only if you are truly aware of the real I, the witness, the looker, and you can only be sure after a long and intensive practice of investigating the mind. Without that learned discrimination, you can be surrendering to yet another object posing as the I, such as the ego. Therefore, beware of those who say no practice is necessary. It is not necessary or even possible for one who has discovered the true I, the resting state, but doing nothing in terms of practice before becoming aware of what that zero point is, is useless and foolish.

MY OWN METHOD: DOING NOTHING

Robert taught the "Who am I?" self-inquiry process only because SOME people felt they needed a method or way to occupy their mind. All methods, Robert taught, lead to silence. Deep silence, the "deepest" is not only where the absolute is revealed, but also is the absolute.

All of the above "methods" were those I practiced for years with no real change. They resulted in all kinds of experiences and new understandings, but there was no release or death of the I­ness. Only many little deaths.

This leads me to an observation. Most practitioners are too much wrapped up in their experiences and explaining them, rather than persisting in going inward. It is as if they can't take the boredom of self-inquiry, and turn it into an intellectual discussion with the guru or teacher. They want their old "reality" of pseudo human contact with the guru, while the guru is only interested in taking them beyond anything they ever experienced or imagined.

This is time wasted, especially the time spent that so many people seem to, to understand an experience they had ten or twenty years ago. It is as if they think they can get that experience back, that is the end of their seeking, bringing them to rest.

Any experience that is not repeatable and frequent is worthless.

When I met Robert I just surrendered to him after about year two. I knew deeply that any method I practiced was only in the mind and could not destroy the personal I-ness. I was just massaging the ego--the mixture of imaginal "gases" I call the imaginal space or world. The surrender is an approach to the resting state. “I give up; not mine Lord, but Thine.”

But, even this trust and surrender had not led to release by the time Robert left Los Angeles. When Robert left for Sedona I felt completely alone, abandoned.

However, the process of getting Robert packed and moved was quite chaotic and nerve racking, so much that I started just relaxing and listening to Eastern sacred music, especially that of Muktananda and Yogananda to escape the tension and because I didn’t know what else to do. This movement was forced on me, I could do no other.

I would just lay on a couch for hour after hour, day after day, week after week, listening to and being carried away by the music, thoroughly enjoying the unfolding show of consciousness within, the forms, the thoughts, the inner and out sensations. My body relaxed most of its tension. I felt I was sinking into myself. I did almost nothing except eat and do some walking. I began to feel blissfully happy. I was becoming totally nothing, but not in the Zen way of the Void, but in the personal way of being carried away by the bliss and happiness of chanting. I was relaxing into beingness, pulled inside by the happiness of doing nothing except being with all internal and external phenomena.

Then one day, an awakening happened in the form of the shower experience I describe elsewhere on this site and call the first  awakening.[2]

I can hardly recommend this to anyone else. I loved sacred music and chanting. I also loved dwelling in emptiness and silence when listening to the chanting. Therefore, few would benefit, were they not also so also disposed. They would just get restless.

One similar method that might work better for you would be to take all of Robert's recorded talks, put them on an MP3 player, an iPod, an external speaker system, or an MP3 or iPod playing clock radio, and just listen to them. Just listen to the talks whenever you have any time. Have sacred music in the background.

All of Robert's talks are always directed towards getting you to enter silence. His talks will repeatedly bring you to silence. The music will/could cause bliss. Both together allow complete relaxation, a melting of the sense of self--individuality--into a complete sense of happiness. You might say this is the easy way, but only if you are ready for it. Years of intense practice are usually a prerequisite, because one is used to using the mind to discover or create anything. When the mind is clearly seen as something that will not work to complete the task of awakening, there is a profound relaxation and sinking into deeper level of self, as Rajiv talks about in Autobiography of a Jnani.

By the way, the alarm on some clock radios can be set to pick a specific talk by Robert or a random one. You might want to be awakened by his instructions on how to practice self inquiry.

If you read the biographies or autobiographies of the great teachers, each will describe a different process and may

actually recommend processes which were different from their own because they see the idiosyncrasy of their own processes, and like me, see that the way I did it would not work for all.

Probably one "method" closest to my "spontaneous method," I describe as "falling backwards into the self."

Lots of people identify the "feeling" of self, or "I Am," as the feeling of the totality of the body. Actually, it is not, but it feels that way initially to many.

The method is to feel that sense of self as initially manifest as the body sense, and then imagine or feel yourself falling backwards into it. Falling backwards by relaxing more and more into the comfort of those apparent body sensations. It is quite blissful and settling.

Sometimes, there is a sense of a dark presence behind oneself, which is identified as one's resting state. If you feel that strongly, imaginatively relax and fall backwards into that dark emptiness. The relaxation is the same.

Almost all of these methods will produce useless experiences and understanding that will go away but which might seem world shaking at the time. So, don't stop. Keep going.

I want to be quite clear: None of these methods will produce awakening/enlightenment/self-realization or whatever you want to call this state that you presently do not know yourself. All methods are on the level of mind.

Long practice of a method does not produce awakening, but, you might say, allows it to happen. I think that Nisargadatta said it best when he said someday the I Am lets you go.

However, all in all, I would first recommend people download the Nisargadatta Gita, print it out, put it in a 3 ring binder and "practice" by reading a few paragraphs every morning. Then reflect on those words, then meditate on the sense of I Am awakened, if it is awakened at all. This is a most excellent meditation manual, a wide road to release.