Freedom from the limited sense of me (Magdi 10-02-2022)

In this meditation, the speaker encourages us to simply be without knowing everything that appears to us. They explain that we are aware space, a presence that perceives reality without being limited by it. They emphasize that we don't need to try to be anything or improve ourselves, but rather embrace the open field of not knowing. The speaker discusses the belief that we are limited and separate, but explains that our true nature is pure awareness and consciousness, not confined to the body or mind. They suggest that we perceive the sense of self as a simple appearance, like a cloud in the sky, without attaching significance to it. Ultimately, they remind us that we are not defined by external circumstances and that nothing can truly impact our true nature. Okay, welcome everyone. Lovely to be with you. So if we can, for the duration of this meditation, simply be without knowing everything that appears to you, the sound, the voice, the hearing, the breath, whatever bodily sensations and images, thoughts appear to you, they appear in this open, borderless space of awareness. You are this aware space, this presence, the reality which perceives the reality which is, which knows it is. Lacking nothing and seeking nothing. Awake, aware, alive. But not limited by whatever appears to it. Whatever appears to you, like clouds appearing in the wide open sky. You are this wide open sky. Not trying to be anything, not trying to become anything, trying to improve anything. Not trying. Don't need to fix anything which appears to you. Even though it may be a very intimate bodily sensation, a feeling, simply we may not knowing. Because not knowing is the open field. There's no position taken, no particular point of view about this or that, about myself, about the world. And yet there's complete presence. There's an open presence, an open spacious presence which is effortless. This effortlessness presence is universal being, universal presence, not my own personal doing, my own personal presence. It's the peace of being. Which is recognizing itself this moment. The sense of limitation, the sense of being, the personal limited sense of being. The mortal form is an inevitable appearance, an inevitable impression which goes hand in hand with the belief that I am a person, that I am awareness, I am consciousness. I am a limited male or female body, mind, form existing in time and space, born to parents. This belief is the choice of consciousness to identify itself with a particular form, with a history, a past, future. When what is available to you is the understanding that I am consciousness is not the mortal form, is not the body, mind. This belief of being limited, of being separate, of being mortal has no grounds upon which to stand. That what I is, is pure awareness, pure consciousness, which is neither male nor female, which is not located behind the eyes or inside the brain or within the chest. There's no location to awareness. There's no location to I, no limited fixed position to consciousness awareness. What is available to you is the direct knowingness of yourself as the aware aspect, as the reality of consciousness, the one reality, whatever way you name it, that I is real, not I as a body, mind, which appears and disappears. But I as the reality which perceives right now, which is right now, which knows it is. So this sense of me is made out of the belief that consciousness is personal and limited. And the bodily sensations which are interpreted as evidence of the limitation of consciousness. In other words, consciousness is limited because I feel I am limited. It's an interpretation of a sensation as being evidence that the reality of consciousness is limited and personally dependent on the body. We overlook that the sensations and feelings are perceptions, they are perceived. They are known, but they are not knowing. In other words, they don't reveal anything about the reality which perceives them. They reveal nothing about our true nature. They reveal nothing about the reality of consciousness. So we can perceive this sense of me as a simple appearance, like a cloud appearing in the sky, or a current appearing in the ocean without any significance outside of me, the way in which consciousness is appearing right now, appearing as a thought, as a feeling, as a being, while remaining as it is. You are not subject to what unfolds in the world or what unfolds in the body or mind. You are the consciousness, the awareness, the nominal reality of all phenomenal impressions. The nominal reality of all false perceptions and sensations. The nominal is not defined by the phenomenal. So you can allow the sense of me to be as it is. No need to argue with it or try to get rid of it or fix it. Allow it to be like you allow the reserve to be, like you allow the world to be. Nothing is happening to you. Nothing defines you.