Let’s consider “Verse 23” from Sri Ramana Maharshi’s seminal Ulladu Narpadu or “Verses on What Is” (trans. Michael James):

This body does not say ‘I’. No one says ‘In sleep I do not exist’. After one thing, ‘I’, rises, everything rises. Contemplate by a subtle mind where this ‘I’ rises.

Undeniably, you have a sense of being yourself. What is that sense? What is the nature of your being, of yourself?

It seems as if there’s some sort of connection or association between “I” and the body. But is that a real connection, or is the association merely fictional?

If we wish to know what this sense of being oneself really is, we should, to begin with, reflect very deeply on the opening line: “The body does not say ‘I.’” Bhagavan is saying that it’s not possible for “I” to be the body (as in the “I am the body” idea). Why not?

Take any of the five bodies I touched upon yesterday: the gross body, the energy body, the mind body, the intellect body, or the blissful state body. Know, through careful investigation, that the physical never says “I,” nor does the energetic, nor does the mental itself adopt the subjective position of the I (though it appears to), nor does the intellect actually take the subjective position of the I (though it also appears to), nor does the blissful sheath directly experience I-ness. In brief, all these sheaths, or bodies, are objects–albeit increasingly rarified ones. Being objects, they can never be “I.”

Since no body whatsoever ever says or feels I-ness, then where does this sense of I-ness come from?

The plot thickens because “No one says ‘In sleep I do not exist’” (my emphasis). This line can be read in at least two ways. In the first sense, Bhagavan is saying that there’s nobody–no ego entity–here to even say or pronounce “I” during deep sleep. In the second sense, he’s telling us that the real “I” is continuously present throughout all states (waking, dream, and sleep).

Let’s just stick with the first sense for the rest of this post. If we do, then we have a mystery on our hands: since all bodies are objects, no body can say, “I.” Moreover, the mere uttering or feeling of “I” is an arising (as we learn in the first sense from the second line). In which case, the question arises, “Who, then, says or feels ‘I’”?

Now we have the real nub–the real girth–of the question: the sense of I-ness has arisen. What is this rising or emerging “I,” or what is the source of this emerging “I”?

Don’t jump the gun. Really feel that there is a deep question here. Then see that this sense of I is nothing but ego, the mystery of ego-arising.

What makes this matter especially uncanny or mysterious is that the sense of I associates itself with some form or other. This association of the I with one form or another Bhagavan terms the “I-thought” or what I’ve referred to as the “I-sense.”

We ultimately discover the truth of the third statement, which is that the world, others, the body idea, and all the rest rise with or after the I-thought has arisen. Consequently, the point we finally “get” is that the I-thought is seminal, primal and, accordingly, must be investigated first. The investigation of the I-thought takes metaphysical precedence.

The name of this first and ultimate investigation is “Self-inquiry” or atma vichara. And what does it look like? “Contemplate by a subtle mind [or keen intellect] where this ‘I’ rises.” Keenly ask without mentally asking: “Where, indeed, does this sense that I exist as a something come from?” Then see what discover.