Deconstruction

If we look into what we believe about ourselves, we point to this body and the thoughts that arise and call that ME. This is something we learned to do long ago, and the supporting thoughts and emotions that seem to support this belief are strong.

So we go about investigation, which is actually a deconstruction of the belief, a deconstruction of our concepts. We look to see if this belief is true, is there really a separate person, a soul, a spirit, some entity within this organism...

We may see that the words aren't actually what's going on. We see a "sunrise" - it's not actually a "sunrise" but some yellow circle in the sky coming up over the horizon. But what is yellow? What is a circle? What is sky? More words. So through this we see the inherent falseness of words. We can't actually say anything about what's going on! We can't even say it's separate - we can't define a subject/object relationship without using words. But the experience of a sunrise is there.

So we look at the "person", the "self", the "me", the "I"... more words... so what is this that we are referring to? There is an apparent experience of being a body-mind organism.

At some point, we may realize that this "ME" is only a thought or feeling or sensation and is not always there, like the sunrise. We're using the words to refer to a sensation or thought "I" - but what is this referring to? What is the sense of "I" referring to?

Isn't it referring to the sense of beingness, aliveness, existence, awareness, knowingness? Isn't that what you really are? The very knowing?

So we don't experience an addition to our knowledge, but a dropping away, an absence... we find that THAT which we were seeking is exactly that which we really are. We find that there never was a person to seek. We find that which we believed in to be absent, to be non-existing. We lose the personal identification.

So everything that's apparently happened, happened to no one. There never was a "you" to do any of it. The "you" didn't miraculously drop away, it simply never was there. All the suffering and regret and guilt and fear was just a reference to something that never existed.

The belief and constant reference to ME falls away. And in this, it is very obvious that "I" could never have done anything, "I" can never be affected by anything, simply because there is no "I". So all that's apparently happened, happened to and by no one. There is complete freedom and peace because there is no "I" to worry about it, no "I" to choose, no "I" to live or die.