A monologue on what the self actually is, drawing from Christianity, Buddhism, and Hinduism. The speaker argues the self is consciousness beyond form and thought, not the body or mind you think you are.
What is self? Now, I notice that it's spelled with a capital S. I don't know whether it's a mistake or on purpose. Probably on purpose. There's one self. That's the illusion, which is the identification with the mind, and the ego, which is the unobserved mind. And there's a self that arises there that is a dreadful burden to live with. You carry around most people for their whole life. They carry the burden of a mentally defined sense of who they are. Me. What about me? That's the little self, the illusory self. And that's the self that most people refer to when they say I. But I potentially has a deeper meaning and is the deepest word, perhaps we could say in the language. In its truest sense, I refers to who you are beyond the form, beyond the thoughts and the emotions. You as the consciousness, is the self. Now, the self has no form. You cannot grasp it, you cannot see it. You cannot really define it. You can never say, ah, there it is. Because who is saying that you are the consciousness, the perceiving. You are it. You can never see it as an object external to yourself. It's the essence. You are not what is seen. You are the seeing. You are the consciousness behind the seeing. You are not what you hear. You are the consciousness behind what you hear. So this is what Jesus said when he used to jump the kingdom of heaven, or the kingdom of God. He said in one of the Gospels, the kingdom of heaven does not come with signs to be observed. You cannot say, ah, here it is, or ah, it's over there. It's a free translation, more or less. That's what he said. And of course, what do Christians do? They're waiting for the kingdom of heaven to arrive. When they've been told you won't be able to see it, you can't say, ah, there it is. It does not come with signs to be observed. Literally, he said that. And I'm sure that's one of the. There's a lot of things that people later put into his mouth, but that is one of the things. Words that were uttered by somebody who knew the reality. It doesn't come with science to be yourself. You can never see it or grasp it or know it as an object for your knowledge because you essentially are it as the consciousness that perceives, the consciousness behind your thinking, behind your emotions, behind your perceptions, behind your experiences. The very light of the world. Another thing he said, he not only said, jesus, I am the light of the world. He said also, you are the light of the world. So he's pointing. What is the light is the light of consciousness which illuminates the world. You are that. That is the self. It has no form. Therefore, it seems that Buddhism and Buddhists and Hindus are in disagreement, but only those who haven't realized the reality behind their teachings. Those Buddhists and Hindus who have not really realized the reality behind their teachings, they are in disagreement and they have arguments whether there is self or no self. Atman, anatman. The Hindus believe in Atman, that the existence of self, the fundamental underlying reality. And the Buddhists say, no anatman, no self. And then whenever you see a Hindu and a Buddhist discussing, perhaps even with negative emotions, whether one or the other is true, then you'll know that they haven't experienced, they haven't known the reality behind the teaching, because the reality behind the teaching is exactly the same. It's just a different perspective on the same. The Buddhists like to deny. They don't want to give it, call it something. As if the moment you call it, you say the self. The danger is that you make it into a mental object and start believing in it. The Buddhists don't like that. So they say there is no self, which in a way is true. Also. There is nothing that you could say, there it is. It is an empty space, almost, you could say, but it is potential fullness also. It is full and empty at the same time. All the same, the self. That's why the Dalai Lama I saw giving a talk a while ago to Hindus, and he said, you believe in Atman and we believe in Anatman. What does it matter? And he laughed. Makes no difference. That's a good answer. It.
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