A meditation on presence and consciousness. The speaker argues that awareness of the present moment is fundamental, and that consciousness itself is the space where all experience occurs. Sense perception becomes the gateway to understanding what's actually happening right now.
First level of being aware of the present moment is to be aware of your sense perceptions. That brings the first step into the present moment. Then perhaps you are aware of your breathing and your inner body and then sense perception at the same time. So first you become aware of where you are, what's around you or what you're doing. And then you go deeper into the present moment. And the essence of the present moment is you. So the essence of what we call the present moment is consciousness. And consciousness is the space in which everything happens. Consciousness is the one thing that never changes, is the present moment. It's always now. It's always now. And what is the present moment in essence? In essence, the present moment is not what happens in the present moment. The deeper essence is the present moment is the space for whatever happens. And there's the space like the canvas, however you want to call it. So you are aware of yourself ultimately as the present moment. And this realization that ultimately you are the present moment, that those words had not come to me when I was writing the Power of Now, so it never got into the book because the words came to me after I'd already written the book, said, oh, I should have put that in. Oh, no, why didn't I put that in? Oh, you're no good. I didn't do that. So you sense the essence of what present moment really means as consciousness. The one thing that is beyond any doubt that you are right now conscious. And that's not the right way of putting it. If I say you are conscious, you are consciousness is better. You are consciousness. It.
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