Who are you?
You know you know
Everything in life seems to begin with a question – where, who, how, when, why and many more, but what question did we begin with? Of course, we ask ourselves, and we should ask ourselves who we are, but in the case of us, this question serves only as a reminder, as it is not our beginning, but it can point us to our origin.
Everything in life we try out, we test and experience. Every child, sometime in their life, approaches a fire, and that is how it learns to be careful around it. Whether it burns itself a little the first time or someone protects it, the fact remains that it will draw closer, feel the warmth, examine the distance, probe the flames... and such is the way we follow with everything in life. We see something and questions begin to form in us – what it feels like to do that, to be like this, to live a certain way, what does anything taste like, etc., and so we go on and try.
Why then would it be different when asking the fundamental question of ourselves? Why would it be left unchecked, without experiment, without evidence, without trial and without error, why would it not be another life experience, the same way we learn about anything? Why wouldn’t we need to go, do and feel certain ways to come to a true understanding of ourselves? Why would we be satisfied with an external, formal, intellectual answer and omit the true experience of who we are? Why would we only live with a dream – an imagined creation of an image of who we are and not attempt entering the depth and truth of our life and being, as it actually is? Why would we avoid, postpone and cower at it, when it is offering the single most valuable answer during our earthly existence: who are we?
We want the truth of who we are? – It is on display for us to observe and on offer for us to walk. We need not fall into despair or lose our courage when we discover many, many things that we do, that we endure, that we suffer, that we feel and that we fear, which are not us. Life is a process of discovery, but it is not only that. We discover what is in our own way, what veil is there covering our true nature, our true self, our essence and our core being – our soul – but life is much more than that!
The more we discover about ourselves and the more we accept the truth of things, the closer we draw to our true self. There is truth to us and a falsity to suffering, but where we stand there is also a truth to suffering and a falsity to us, and our life is the opportunity to drop all falsity and fully enter truth.
To arrive at ourselves, though, we need to follow life’s way and not our own way, as the falsity to us will lead us to the truth of suffering. To understand our suffering and be free from it, we must follow the truth of our life until we see the truth of suffering and its dependence on the falsity of self. We need to walk, discover and learn to understand all that – there is no easier, neither more truthful or fulfilling way than this, and this is our life path, as it is laid before us and it can only be accessed by adhering to truth – the truth in our hearts and souls – the truth that whispers its guidance to us without ceasing, if we are only there to listen.
The closer we come to who we really are, the closer we draw to where we come from. It will happen by itself, as it is the natural progression of discovery until we come to deeply and fully know our being and the truth that invigorates it.
The beginning and the end mark the start and finish of an attempt at discovery – not of the reality of life. Life is much more us than it is something “else”, but we need to try this out, walk it and experience it to believe it, trust it and eventually love it back the way it loves us. That is when the miracle happens – we become what we always were...
