Question

It’s said that the Self is all that truly exists. It’s then said that “I am the Self.”

A common question is: “Though I hear these teaching statements, I do not directly realize them. Why is that?”

The answer, roughly, is that one is still taking one’s stand as the finite mind, not as the aware presence that is none other than the Self. In the following account, what is underscored is “forgetfulness.”

Pramada

This Tamil term means “the forgetting of the Self” or the turning away from the Self. To forget the Self (pramada) by turning away from it is the illusory appearance of ignorance.

Self-inquiry As Remembrance

If forgetfulness of the Self is like getting lost in a fascinating–or horrifying–mental dreamscape, then self-inquiry, on this construal, is like exiting, or stepping out of, this dreamscape.

To exit this dreamscape is to “remember the Self.” Indeed, it is to be knowingly the Self so remembered.

Practice

One may ask, “But how is one to remember the Self?”

Whenever any I-thought or I-imagining appears, simply discard the “thought part” or “imagination part” and hold onto the I.

Is this I limited or unlimited? Is this I thinkable or imageable? What, indeed, is the nature of this I?

Hold onto the I alone and abide as silence.