Dear Rupert,
I see that things just happen and that awareness is, without anything I do. I see that if I identify with this conscious presence and then see what it is (nothing, like a mirror, but also everything), then I am also nothing and yet everything is without any centre. Yet this separate self lingers like a large tumour in the forehead and that is the centre. Is there a particular question or practice that ultimately worked to end this illusion for you, or is it like the other non-dualists say: one just waits for grace to alight while walking or shopping!
Thanks
Jeff
Dear Jeff,
It is not necessary to identify oneself as conscious presence. Who is the one who would do that? That one, you, the only one that truly is, is already conscious presence. There is no other one. It is only a thought that imagines that you, this conscious presence, has qualities such as location, limitation, duration and age, and with this belief the infinite, ever-present self that we are seems to become a separate, limited, located entity, moving around in time and space and destined ultimately for death.
The tumour-like sensation in the head that you refer to is just one of innumerable apparent objects that appear in you, conscious presence. To mistake that sensation for presence, for your self, is like imagining that this very computer screen on which you are reading these words is contained solely within and dependent upon this word but not in any of the other words, images or documents that you are presently seeing. It is that silly!
In fact, the screen is not in the words, images or documents. There is just the screen. ‘Word’, ‘image’ and ‘document’ are just the names we give to the screen. There is nothing here other than the screen. It is only when we forget the screen that the words, images or documents seem to acquire a reality of their own. Likewise, it is only when conscious presence is seemingly veiled by dualising thought that objects, entities, people, selves and the world acquire an apparently independent reality of their own.
So what would I recommend? I would suggest simply looking honestly at your experience and seeing clearly that there is no experiential evidence that you, conscious presence, are limited, located, moving, changing, growing old, suffering, and so on. Having seen that, simply live the consequences of this clear seeing in all realms of your life.
You do not need to wait for grace to alight. It has already alighted for you and given you a deep interest in the true nature of experience. It is calling out to you in every moment of your experience.
With love,
Rupert
