The Ego is the Idea ‘I am Something’

So the ego is basically a set of conditions being believed in. We'll come to the believer in a moment, but for the moment it is fine to say that if there was not a single condition being bought into, there is no separation, there is no ego. You see, so empty of that. And that is in a way the exercise that we're doing now also. The beauty of this exercise is: this exercise means non-attachment, non-grasping. And that is: it doesn't matter whether you have a million conditions or you have only two or one. You see, when you're empty, you're empty of all of them. So as high as the highest sage in that moment, we are, you see. So whether you're Bhagavan or you are just little old me, when you're empty of conditions, you are the same.

You see, now this part is clear for everyone. So the ego is a name for attachment or belief in our conditioning. And then when we are oppressed in that, when we are in the mental prison of this conditioning, of these limitations, then when our expression seems to operate under that burden, then we say that person is being egoic, or I was being egoic, or I am being egoic. So this is when we are egoic.

Now we just said that empty of all of that we are the same. Now what is that sameness? Have we ceased to exist? We haven't ceased to exist. Even perception is here. You're hearing. You could be empty. You could not be identifying with the body. And yet the centrality of this visual perspective may continue. All of this world may be perceived. And yet you're not identified. You're not being egoic. You see? So that being empty of being something is called the I am.

You see, so that is the I am. Because I am: even this, somebody says, so who's perceiving now? Unless we become very intellectually like this: with the innocence of a child, you ask them, so who is looking at this, or who sees this? They will say I am. You see, even before, like at a very young age when they just start to speak, they will respond in those innocent ways, you see. Empty of any conditions or pride or sense of ownership in that moment.

So empty of all identification, if I was to say whose perception, you say I am aware, you see. But that I am is not adulterated by conditions of pride, of unworthiness, of any of these ideas. So you're empty of the ego and you're just being. And that being is whose being? It belongs to I. But that I is the eye of reality. You see, the eye of awareness.

So that pure awareness which is aware, it doesn't change even in sleep state. Then the adjunct of am wakes up within that, and in the light of this I-amness, then the world appears. You see, when the world appears, then all these play of light and sound happens. And also in the play of light and sound, one plays that of these mental concepts, language in our head, which is offering us these proposals: that I am something, I should be better, I can learn this, I can. So attaching to those, as harmless as they may seem initially. Like: I like green coconut better than, you know, brown coconut. Like, what's so egoic in that, you see? But you know, notice that oh, it happened because when I was a child I had this tree, you see. So the whole narrative is stuck in the most harmless-seeming notions. So to remain empty, innocent of even that, is to remain empty of ego.

You see, so this I which is pure awareness then gives birth to this am which is pure being. I am. It is I am. See, nobody says I was asleep but then somebody woke up. They say I woke up. It's most natural to say I woke up, because it is the I itself in its manifest aspect as being, as am, which arises. Suddenly the light comes on. Nobody knows how, nobody knows when, nobody knows why. Just this am comes. You see.

Now in this am, imagine the world in which it was impossible to identify. This world just wakes, everything is. But then some may have a complaint against the game designer, saying: it's visually nice but it's not relatable. You see, like we see many movies, we call them art films or something. You see, which may even look visually nice but suppose it's visually very compelling and yet it didn't have a narrative you could resonate with. You see, so the theory, our primitive-sounding theory, is that entertainment without relatability was not enough juice for God playing this game.

God said: let me make it so that when I play the game, not only do I have the body of James Bond or whoever, I also have a narrative that I have been given this mission. I have to rescue this country, or this prime minister of this country. I have to save the world in this way. You see, and in that picking up of the narrative, this I am takes up the idea that I am James Bond or whatever. In the same way we are playing the same game. I am Ananta. I am Bala. I am this. I am that.

And now to not identify, to have no narrative, no mission. You see, then what happens? The narrator of the game still continues. Like, you stop paying attention to the subtitles doesn't mean the subtitles of the movie will stop. They may stop at one point, but initially it will seem like the narrative continues. But that narrative is designed to make you identify as the character in the game, as the character around which the game seems to be centered, out of whom you seem to be perceiving this world. But that is the same for the dream: that we seem to be perceiving a world out of the central perspective of this character.

So to be free from that identification, from that one, is to be free from the ego. But the I: so that is why the sages have said, Bhagavan said, I removes the eye and yet remains the eye. So that is impossible for the mind to understand. Isn't it? It removes the false eye. The I am something. The egotism is removed. And yet the true eye, the Brahman, that is our true reality, remains. That is why it's called self-realization. It's still the self but it is not a limited self. It is not an egoic self. The difference between big Self and small self is very big. Got a sense of what I'm thinking?