Adyashanti in his book The End of Your World, says rather dramatically — “There is no you that awakens. There is awakening from the you“. This might be easy to realize intuitively, and yet might take time to realize it.

Given this to the mind, the immediate question that it brings up is “but who awakens”.  And that is how the illusion persists. In our simplest existence, we experience life happen — water drops falling, voice of our friends, co-workers, family talking, the swish of that dog’s tail, the burp inside, the sigh, even the chirpy thoughts inside, and when we really need to, we run, run from a predatory big cat or wince at the hearing of a loud noise. And when we can, we can type, we can create stories, we can write code, we can arrange things, we can play a game. And yet in all these moments, we are in the moment. Was there an imaginary concept? There were real things happening.

And then, there is a state, where we are just unhappy. Not sure why that is that way. Or that person is this way. Or why can’t I achieve that. Or, wondering how will I face that tomorrow. Or next month. There is an element of falsehood, that is sneaking underneath. In that moment, there is a lack of tangibility. This ‘I’ that is unsure how to face tomorrow, is a projection. False projection. A real projection is tangible. You can project that object that is about to fall. You can project that sunrise that is going to happen at a certain time. And even when a projection is not certain, you assign probability and confidence levels to it. There is a lot that we cannot project.

Even if you believe this false projection. See what it does to you in some time. It dances all over. It takes the joy away from the moment. It causes endless suffering, that has no real basis. The irony is that it is only when there is a waking up to the real nature of this suffering that this falsehood slowly starts to lose its hold.

The falsehood does not go away in a day. But it loses its sway. So who awakens really? Ah, and there is a question that loses its sway.