Only one.

Only: “I am.”

Can’t be two. No, never.

Honestly, you’ve never had, nor can you ever have, any experience of a second self.

Language, here, is bewitching as sentences like “I loved myself,” I myself reflected upon the course of my life” betray a patent misunderstanding.

Investigate:

Can you go toward yourself? Can you move away from yourself? Can you “remember yourself”? Forget yourself? Hold on to yourself? Concentrate on yourself?

Even meditators get seduced. Who is sitting here meditating on the Self, huh? Who is concentrating intently and intensely on “I am”?

Too much. One extra. Cut it–the ignorance–out.

For, no, the truth, as plain as day when the mind sinks away, is that there is only: “I am.” To emphasize this point, we may say here, “I am that I am” or “I am I am,” but both can begin to sneakily look like a false doubling up.

Shall we repeat the same?

I never go toward myself; can’t possibly move away from myself; can’t attain or lose myself; can’t find myself. Really, I can’t even discover myself.

Why?

Because I only ever am myself. More reflexive sentences, though.

Drop the ignorance: that’s all. Hence, the highest teaching is: “I am.” Or: “Just silently be.” Or: “Refrain from apparently going out of yourself and just be.”

Not even, or ever, a QED. Simple as pie.