How Do We Go Looking for the Self? - 22nd December 20187

So our theme has been this: How do you go looking for the Self? And why is it that if the Self is myself, why do we see so many frustrated seekers? Maybe one basic misunderstanding could be that you will perceive an object as the Self. You will come to the discovery of the Self as if it is an object, or it will be at least an object of perception. Because I know, I know when I say object, you might think that I'm talking about just objects which are visible through sight. I'm talking about all phenomena in imagination, memory—whatever the experience of some phenomena might be. We are expecting to find the complete Self as if it is some objectivity, some appearance, and this is bound to be frustrating.

Now, if I was to tell you that the reality of you is beyond phenomena, how would you go looking for it? Where would you move? In which direction? If you have to go beyond phenomena, where do you have to go to search? So if we came to play the game, see, our main rules have been to look for things objectively. We said you have to get to John Millington, somebody here for the first time, so they follow this direction, go left or go right, and there you will find it. Now the thing is, with the Self, you cannot find it that way. You cannot find it objectively because it is beyond phenomena.

So now, which way will you go? You might feel like if I come to some special Satsang and the Master is really powerful, then I will have a special experience which is called the Self. But whatever the experience might be, it is only a byproduct of the Self. Just like every other experience, no experience is the Self. Are you looking at me trying to decode this puzzle? How do we find something that is not phenomenal, that is not perceivable through our five senses or through that which we call in our perception? Where do you go?

Left or right, up or down, front or back? Not in open space, not in time or space. No way you can travel that will get you the Self. And you don't have to wait for the starting point, that the Self will come, so it has a beginning. Thinking it is waiting in some place will also not get you the Self. The Self will come now—that's not going to happen, because those are definitions of phenomena. How to find that which is beyond phenomena? The Sages have given us the clues. Kabir Ji said, 'Ask who am I.' What do the simple teachings, simple pointings say? Whatever you perceive, find out what the witness is. That which witnesses, can this perceiver be perceived?

Starting to leave the phenomenal for that which we call inside. Some of you would have answered, 'I can only find it inside, I cannot find it outside.' But that which you call inside actually is beyond this phenomenal layer; it is not inside the body. So these questions: Are you aware now? Who is aware of your existence? Who am I? Can the perceiver be perceived? Although these are not subject to time and space, so I ask you, with as much innocence as you can muster, check if you are aware now. Are you aware? What is the color of this awareness? What is its size? What is its age?