Continued from Verse Thirteen
14. If the first person, I, exists, then the second and third persons, you and he, will also exist. By enquiring into the nature of the I, the I perishes. With it 'you' and 'he' also perish. The resultant state, which shines as Absolute Being, is one's own natural state, the Self.
Commentary: If I believe that I exist as an independent entity, then I can draw a boundary between I and the not-I. That not-I will include you, and will include he, she, and it. It’s all founded on the idea that I am a separate, doing, experiencing person. Otherwise none of these boundaries, none of these names and forms, could be created.
But if we look into the nature of this seeming I, which is nothing other than the ego, it vanishes. When all the ‘not-I’ is cut away, what remains has no boundary. But the not-me was created by being contrasted by a bounded I. Other things can only exist against a background of a “me” that is solid, against which they can be contrasted. If that I with boundaries is actually something infinite, meaning non-bounded, everything else that is drawn with reference to it cannot be sustained. Without a solid, bounded I, the not-I cannot be sustained.
That creates a kind of cascading black hole. All the objects, feelings, ideas, people, memories — in short, all experience, only makes sense if they occur to an I. If that I is not what it seems to be, then experience is not what it seems to be.
What remains beyond boundaries is the natural state, the Self. This is the natural state because every other state is merely a thought, and so comes and goes. This natural state is unchanging. It is beyond concepts, indescribable. It is natural because it cannot be the product of any process and so cannot be altered by any process.
At any time, see all the forty verses posts that I have published so far here.