Today, as I walked back home from a meditative stroll in the wood, this though came to me:
“I am not what Am is”
A though, a memory of a female friend stating out loud shamelessly “I am a natural squirter”.
Followed by another thought about me thinking “I am a great kisser”.
And the voice of Mooji saying “forget about yourself” resonating in a corner of my mind.
Lately I did listen a lot to Mooji’s and Napoleon Hill’s videos in background, while working on an electronic layout, pulsed and pumped up by some high energy progressive trance playing over in the headphones. Those teachings must have sunk into my subconscious mind...
Indeed, in the calmness of the wood, as my mind cleared up in this moment of contemplation a glimpse of infinite wisdom fell on me like a sun-ray through the dense canopy.
My though is that maybe I should stop to formulate my affirmations using “am” and say instead “I + action verbs”.
“I can make love well”, instead of “I am a great lover”.
“I can swim well”, instead of “I am a good swimmer”.
“I live in Switzerland” instead of “I am Swiss”.
The nuances, so small it may be, I can explain so:
I feel that to say “I am” feeds a sense of identity crafted by beliefs and influences from social and cultural environment. Mooji asking “Who is speaking those word? We have assumed it is us. There is a lot of identity in this. Where there is an identity, there is an “I“ entity, which is not what these identities are”.
“Swimmer”, “Lover”, “Swiss”, “Good person”,” chocolate addict”, “vine amateur”.
Those are entities. Like fields in a data structure or an object in Java script program.
Each time I use “am” + “entity”, I’m adding a new field or I’m looking up one in this data structure, thus identifying with its content; the labels. In my understanding, inspired by J. Kirshnamurti, this thinking process implicitly creates a kind of index of performance and a grading of quality that we apply to each experiences according to statements we made to us.
By saying “I am sth”, we create a statement to which we ought to conform to. They become part of our self-concepts and forms a shallow identity.
“I am a good person”. What if I don’t give a nickel to the beggar at the exit of the metro station? Am I bad then?
What if I think “I am a great lover” but this night, I can’t make my partner come. There is an internal contradiction happening in my mind. My experience is assessed and judged according to what I believed is part of my identity; sometimes leading to self-talk revolving in negativity and self-criticisms.
If I express myself with less “am” and more “I + action verbs”, I could potentially reduce this process of comparing experiences and judging ourselves based on previous performances by avoiding altogether to form or to entertain identities.
I intuitively feel that there is less to no attachment to identities this way. There is no comparison of the previous experiences with the one I’m living right now. Of course, the grammar requires the use of "am". However, what I'm talking about here is the self concepts we entertain in the present tense through the use of "I am" statements.
I my understanding of Mooji's teaching, there is just "I" that remains when the mind has silenced. Then "am" is already a thought and a kind of primordial self concept perceived by the "I", the observer, our true essence which is... unspeakable ... pure "awareness". Mooji's video
It is to stop to cover the “I” with “am” labels. Less self-concept identities. Peeling off layers to reach closer to the “I”, entity.
I welcome comments and thoughts.
Some inspiring quote from J. Krishnamurti:
Meditation, on the contrary, is a state of mind in which there is no concept or formula, and therefore total freedom.
Then meditation is an eternal movement. I don't know if you have ever meditated, if you have ever been alone, by yourself, far away from everything, from every person, from every thought and pursuit, if you have ever been completely alone, not isolated, not withdrawn into some fanciful dream or vision, but far away, so that in yourself there is nothing recognizable, nothing that you touch by thought or feeling, so far away that in this full solitude the very silence becomes the only flower, the only light, and the timeless quality that is not measurable by thought. Only in such meditation love has its being. Don't bother to express it: it will express itself. Don't use it. Don't try to put it into action: it will act, and when it acts, in that action there is no regret, no contradiction, none of the misery and travail of man.
So meditate alone. Get lost. And don't try to remember where you have been.
The ecstasy of solitude comes when you are not frightened to be alone no longer belonging to the world or attached to anything.
