Here and Now Is All There Is
Aquí y Ahora Es Todo Lo Que Hay
This meditation invites you to look closely at what you call "I" and discover whether awareness comes before or after your thoughts.
Here and Now Is All There Is
The present moment as pointer
The world of the future, the past, and the present moment are two separate worlds.
But "here and now" is just a tool, just a pointer, to create a contrast.
Here and now includes the past and the future.
It's not a moment between the past and the future.
And so in a sense there is no present moment.
All experience is here and now
All that is here and now is sensations.
All sensations, all perceptions here and now:
sound and sight,
and most importantly all thoughts.
All experience of the past, which is memory, is here and now.
Our experience of the future, which is imagination, is thought, and is here now.
So it is very literal.
There's nowhere to go.
Wherever you go is here and now.
Wherever you could get to will be here and now.
It's just a rearrangement of sensations, perceptions, and thoughts.
Stillness behind movement
So "here and now" points to that which doesn't move,
that which is stillness, which is nothing.
There's no form, no thing,
just the knowing of form and things.
That which knows the movement of thought, perception, sensation
is always at rest,
is empty,
always still.
And it is here now.
And it happens to be identical to what we call "I am."
I, that which knows this.
There are deeper layers to this, but what I'm pointing to now,
that is all that is needed.
Once that is fully understood, seen,
all else comes on its own.
The misunderstanding
A misunderstanding is to assume,
and believe the assumption, that I am is the body or the mind.
We know who we are.
We refer to it every time we say "I."
Just keep noticing, looking.
You know the I am right now.
You know perceptions, sensations of the body.
Noticing how thought conditions the I
Notice thoughts.
I am with thoughts.
I am a person.
I am human.
I am man.
I am woman.
All of that which conditions the I is a thought.
And so the big question is, what comes first?
Is it sensations, perceptions, thoughts, or the I am?
Can there be thoughts without the I am?
Can there be the I am without thoughts?
Or is the I am a thought?
If it is, what knows that thought?
That is the I am.
The inquiry
You clarify this inquiry,
discover more deeply the I am,
its nature, its true nature.
All problems will dissolve.
Our suffering will become playfulness,
cosmic dance,
beauty and love.
That is the heart of the I am: loving everything that is experienced.
Just contemplate that for a moment.
Does this resonate?
Does it hit some deep, subtle sense of truth?
Trust only your own truth.
The leap
If the I am is conditioned by thought,
if the I am is anchored in thoughts,
life will be dukkha, restlessness,
a core sense of self as fleeting images,
vulnerable, ephemeral, impermanent.
But there's a leap.
The leap of faith, or the leap of despair.
If we truly want to know, we must discover ourselves.
Is this I am prior to thought, sensation, and perception?