The Root Of The Search

In this meditation, it is seen that being aware is the unchanging element in all experience and that no practice is needed for being aware.

Transcript

See clearly that whatever we are experiencing,

We are aware of it.

Just check out that.

Statement in your own experience.

Whatever we are aware of,

Sorry,

Whatever we are experiencing,

We are aware of it.

We are aware of the sound of this voice,

The sight of this room.

We are aware of our thoughts and feelings.

We are aware of whatever sensations or perceptions may be present.

Just let your imagination go wherever it wants in experience.

Whatever you encounter,

You are aware of it.

See that being aware is the constant element in all experience.

Everything that we are aware of is continuously changing.

Thoughts,

Images,

Feelings,

Sensations,

Sights,

Sounds,

Tastes,

Etc.

Whatever we are aware of is always appearing and disappearing.

How long does a thought,

Sensation or perception last?

Not very long.

But the experience of being aware remains constant throughout.

The thought that each of us is having now is not the same thought that was present two minutes ago,

Or two hours ago,

Or two days ago,

Or two weeks ago.

The flow of sensations of the body that each of us is aware of now is not the same as it was two minutes ago,

Two weeks ago,

Two months ago.

But the experience of being aware is the same now as it was two moments ago,

Two minutes ago,

Two days ago,

Two months ago,

Two years ago,

Twenty years ago.

Being aware is the only element of experience that never changes,

That never appears or disappears.

Everything else we have ever experienced has vanished.

Every thought,

Every feeling,

Every sensation,

Every perception.

These are vanishing all the time.

How long does a thought last?

How long does a sensation in the body last?

Or the perception of the world?

None of these are lasting.

But the experience of being aware,

Just the simple experience of being aware,

Remains constant,

Unchanging.

It is never affected by what we are aware of.

What is the common name we give to the experience of being aware?

I.

That's what I refers to,

The simple experience of being aware or awareness itself.

Each of us says,

I am aware of my thoughts.

I am aware of the sound of the car.

I am aware of the sight of this room.

I am aware of whatever feelings are present.

They may be pleasant or unpleasant.

I is the name we give to that which is aware of our experience.

It is the unchanging element that runs consistently throughout all experience.

Normally we are so fascinated by what we are aware of.

That is,

We are normally so fascinated by our thoughts and our feelings,

By the state of the body or the perceptions of the world that we are having.

That the simple experience of being aware is overlooked.

We don't notice it.

The experience of being aware is not something that we can be aware of in the same way that we are aware of thoughts and perceptions.

Nevertheless,

Each one of us now has the experience of being aware.

If I were to ask each of you,

Are you aware now?

I hope you would all say yes.

That yes comes from your experience.

It is your experience.

I am aware.

What would happen if I asked you to direct your attention towards the experience of being aware?

Let me just rewind.

If I were to ask you to direct your attention towards the current thought,

Whatever it might be,

Just give that thought your attention.

It's very easy.

We all know exactly where to place our attention.

If I were to suggest directing your attention towards the tingling sensation at the soles of your feet.

Again,

We all know exactly where to direct our attention.

If I were to ask you to direct your attention to these flowers.

We all know where to direct our attention.

And now if I were to ask you to direct your attention towards the experience of being aware.

Where does your attention go?

We have already,

I hope,

Admitted to ourselves that we are aware.

I hope everybody answered yes to the question,

Are you aware?

The reason we answer yes is because it is our experience.

Being aware is our experience.

So what happens when we try to direct our attention towards the experience of being aware?

Try to do that.

What I'm really suggesting is try to turn your attention towards yourself.

We have already established the experience of being aware is called I.

I am aware of thoughts,

Sensations and perceptions.

So when I say turn your attention towards yourself,

I don't mean towards your thoughts or your feelings or your bodily sensations.

You are aware of all of those.

Instead of directing your attention to what you are aware of.

Direct your attention towards the experience of being aware.

What happens to your attention when you try to do that?

The more we try to do that,

The more we realize that it is only possible to direct our attention towards some kind of object.

A thought,

Feeling,

Sensation or perception.

We can't,

As it were,

Turn our attention around and shine it back in the other direction towards that which is aware of these.

It would be like taking a flashlight in a dark room.

And to begin with,

We're shining the flashlight on various objects in the room.

And then someone says to us,

Shine the light on the light bulb from which the beam is coming.

The light bulb is the only thing we cannot shine the flashlight on.

The light bulb is the source of the light beam.

The light beam can never be turned around on itself.

It can only shine on something that is apparently other than itself.

That is the objects in the room.

Likewise,

We can give our attention to thoughts.

We can give our attention to what is being spoken here.

We can give our attention to the sensations of the body.

We can give our attention to the sights in the room or the world.

But we cannot give our attention to the experience of being aware or awareness itself.

Our attention rises from awareness and is directed towards the object.

But awareness is too close to itself to turn around and look at itself.

So how are we going to find out more about ourself?

That is,

About the experience of being aware or awareness itself.

We cannot direct our attention towards it.

We can only direct our attention away from it.

In fact,

It is not the directing of our attention,

But rather the relaxing of our attention.

Instead of trying to direct your attention towards the experience of being aware or awareness itself.

Let your attention relax or sink backwards into its source.

Let your attention relax or sink backwards into its source.

It is not a directing of the attention,

But rather a resting of the attention.

The attention is only needed to know objects,

That is thoughts,

Feelings,

Perceptions,

Etc.

But to know ourself,

Attention is not required.

So just let your attention fall backwards,

Sink backwards into its source.

Allow it to rest in its source.

The source is just the simple feeling of being,

Or being aware.

So,

Let your attention relax or sink backwards into its source.

Let your attention relax or sink backwards into its source.

Have you ever had an experience that is more intimate?

More intimate or familiar than simply being aware?

The experience of being aware is not something that is inaccessible.

If I were to ask you now the question,

Are you aware?

Each of you pause,

Check your experience and say yes.

That's it.

In that pause,

You became aware of being aware.

How far did you have to go?

How hard did you have to look for the experience of being aware?

The experience of being aware is not buried somewhere in the depths of experience.

We don't need to practice a technique for hours or days or years in order to have access to our essential nature of simply being aware.

It is just there.

It is available.

Totally available.

Throughout all experiences,

However wonderful or awful those experiences may be.

Its presence is completely independent of the condition of thoughts,

Sensations and perceptions.

Ask yourself the question,

Is any experience ever at a distance from being aware or the awareness of it?

See that the experience of being aware intimately pervades all our thoughts,

Feelings,

Sensations and perceptions.

That's it.

Ask yourself the question,

Can the experience of being aware ever be disturbed or altered in any way?

Obviously our thoughts and feelings can be disturbed,

Moved,

Changed.

The body and the world are constantly moving and changing.

But what about the experience of being aware?

Is that ever moving and changing?

Is the awareness with which our most intelligent thoughts are known?

Any different from the awareness with which our most unintelligent thoughts are known?

Is it not the same awareness in each case,

The same you in each case that knows the full range of your thoughts?

And what about your feelings,

Your most pleasant and most unpleasant feelings?

Are they not all known alike by you,

By you that which is aware?

See that the experience of being aware or our essential nature of pure awareness intimately pervades all experience,

But is never stained,

Never harmed,

Never moved,

Never conditioned by any particular experience.

No experience leaves a trace on our essential being.

Our essential being is never stained by experience.

It is always in the same pristine condition.

It has never aged.

It has never been aggrandized or diminished by any particular experience.

When you are lost on the streets of Amsterdam,

It is not lost.

It is never lost.

It is never absent.

It may be seem to be temporarily obscured.

When we become fascinated by our thoughts,

Feelings,

Sensations and perceptions,

The experience of being aware seems to be obscured due to the exclusive focus of our attention on the objects.

But even then it is never truly obscured.

At any moment in your experience,

The deepest depression,

Our most wonderful moments,

At any moment in our experience,

We could ask ourselves the question,

Am I aware?

Pause.

The answer is always yes.

The condition of our thoughts and feelings makes absolutely no difference whatsoever.

And we never have to travel far to find that yes.

In fact,

We never have to travel anywhere to find that yes.

That from which the answer yes comes.

Being aware of being aware is always,

Always,

Always our innermost,

Most intimate,

Totally available experience.

Pause.

We are being aware of being aware.

We are,

Whether we know it or not,

Practicing the highest form of meditation there is.

It is the only form of meditation that doesn't require the directing of our attention towards an object.

It is also the essence of what is called prayer in the religious traditions.

The practice of the presence of God,

As the Christian mystics called it.

The Maharshi called it sinking the mind into the heart,

Not the physical heart,

The heart of awareness,

The heart of our being,

Our essential nature,

Which shines in the mind as the knowledge I am,

And which shines in our feelings as the experience of peace or happiness.

It is felt in our relationships as love.

It infiltrates our perceptions as the experience of beauty.

Pause.

And as awareness rests in its own being,

It becomes clear gradually in most cases,

In very few cases suddenly,

But in most cases it becomes clear gradually,

That awareness itself or the experience of being aware doesn't share the limits of what it is aware of.

That is the great discovery.

The knowing with which we know our experience doesn't share the limits or the destiny of any particular experience.

The knowing with which we know our experience or the awareness or consciousness with which we are aware of or conscious of our experience is not conditioned or limited by what we are aware of.

That recognition is what is traditionally called enlightenment or illumination or awakening.

I don't like any of those terms because they confer an exotic flavor on what is in fact just a simple recognition of the unlimited nature of our essential being.

Sometimes this self-recognition is accompanied by colorful experiences in the mind and the body.

And those colorful experiences are sometimes mistaken for this self-recognition.

But this self-recognition can also take place so quietly that the mind doesn't even register it to begin with.

Or if the mind does register it,

It could simply be,

Oh yes,

Of course,

My essential being is always the same.

It has no age.

It has no gender.

It remains the same throughout all experience.

It is always at peace.

It is inherently fulfilled.

Of course,

Why didn't I notice that before?

It can be that quiet and then you carry on with your life as before,

Except that your life is not quite as before.

Because we realize that the self on whose behalf we previously thought,

Felt,

Acted and related was a fictional self.

An apparently temporary,

Limited self made of thoughts and feelings.

We have realized now,

Of course,

I am not a cluster of thoughts and feelings.

Thoughts and feelings have been coming and going all my life,

But I have not been coming and going all my life.

All my life I have been present.

Eye consciousness,

Eye awareness have just remained always the same.

The eye that I was when I said eye as a five year old girl or boy is the same eye that is present now,

Knowing our current experience.

It hasn't grown old.

It's never been sick.

It has no gender.

It has no age.

It's never disappeared.

It didn't appear in the first place.

So it's not going to die.

It was never born.

Just that simple recognition liberates us from the tyranny of the fictional self with all its train of neuroses and fears and demands.

It's not that all those old habits of the separate self disappear overnight.

They don't.

They carry on.

They take some time to be washed out of the system.

But their foundation has been removed.

Their foundation was simply a belief.

Simply a belief that what I essentially am is temporary and finite.

That I was born,

I'm growing old,

I get sick and I'm going to die.

That belief has been removed.

Leaving our essential nature as in fact it has always been.

Eternally present,

Inherently peaceful,

Intimately one with all experience and shared by us all.

There isn't a separate being for each one of us.

When each of us takes the thought I or I am,

Or when each of us goes to the experience of being aware,

We go to the same experience.

Not a similar experience,

The same experience.

That is what the experience of love is.

The cognition that at the deepest level we are literally the same being.

That's what love is.

Isn't that how love feels?

When you feel you love someone deeply,

Don't we feel that we are one with that person?

Don't we feel that everything that separates us from that person dissolves?

Isn't that what the experience of love is?

Love is the recognition of our shared being.

Reviews

Profound. I will definitely come back to this reflective meditation.

I've listened to this several times. It always takes e to peace, freedom, and ease.

Rupert goes deeper than I ever imagined. “Love IS the recognition of our shared being.”

As a long time Buddhist practitioner this breathed new life into my practice. Thank you Rupert.

Thanks so much for this guided meditation. It brought to mind Rumi’s Great Wagon poem for me:

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I’ll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase each other
doesn’t make any sense.

Helpful and lovely.

A classic simplification of Self Awareness - always here now.

Phenomenal listening. Words hardly suffice this experience. Blessings beautiful soul.

This was a great fund, as I’ve been learning about how to sit with or in awareness for the past 18 months. Thank you 🙏🏼 ✨

Inspired and excited by this experience of being aware of awareness: Wow!

I discovered Rupert on Youtube and find his words and questions (in meditations & teachings) incredible helpful to understand the true nature of being. I feel always encoured to go deeper. Thank you so much! 💜

Thank you, Rupert! Wish there were more of your meditations here! 🙏

This is where it’s at. The simple source, thank you 🙏🏼

Life changing. Stopped seeking after only 1 year because of this beautiful soul. So many spend their life “seeking.” It’s insatiable, there’s no end in sight. You can never read all the books every written—- so stop. And let this be your last

Rupert’s perceptions = life - serving and helpful! I am so appreciative of Simon Bartholomew and insight timer for introducing me to Rupert’s inspiring insights/offerings! www.gratefulness.org, ahimsa

Very clear explanation of being mindful,
especially the torchlight analogy. Thank you

This meditation helped bring a few of those magical glimpses where awareness was noticed. But- ha- it was rather like a football game, suddenly there was Awareness like a caught football— hooray! — then all the thoughts came rushing in and tackled it under the huge heap of them.😄 But the glimpses are gorgeous! Like the troubled ground falling away and everything opening out in all directions and no time and utter ease and the sense that everything is always perfect. Grateful for that momentary— and vast- awareness today.

U established the connection with my aware self like no other. Thank you Rupert.
God bless u.

Lucid description of the simple feeling of being. Not hard to reach but rather impossible to avoid. 🙏

Thank you Rupert. Your clarity is priceless. Such a joy to listen to such exquisite clarity. Thank you for conferring the extraordinary gift of self recognition. Om Tat Sat

Rupert has a clarity within his offering's likened to that of zen master. His calm delivery is refreshing & light but holds such profundity as well 💜🙏🏻