How to Be a Nobody, and Why (Part 2)

Ask yourself this question: "Is my body, as it is right now, who I truly am?" Carry that question around with you all day. Pay attention to your body and notice how your body feels, its posture and position, its motions and transitions, and ask yourself, "Is this the real me?"

When this body dies, will you retain any awareness of yourself? Will you still be, as you are in a dream while your body lies in bed? You can dream of yourself on a space ship while your body lies in bed at night. When that happens, where are you? Are you on that ship? Are you in bed? Are you both places simultaneously? Are you both people?

Are you your jaws, your teeth, your tongue, your saliva? Are you your eyes, your hair (if you have any), your arms, your legs (if you have any)? Are you your blood, bones, skin, heart, bladder, toenails? Are you really alive? Were you ever really not alive?

Is your body something you care for, or is it you? You know that you must lose your body? Do you believe that means that you will also lose your self?

If you are not the body, then what are you, and what is your relationship with your body? How do you relate to your body? Do you love it, hate it, take care of it, abuse it? Do you equate that with how you treat yourself? Is someone fat or does someone have a fat body? Is someone beautiful or does someone have a beautiful body?

With awareness focused upon how your body feels, on the state and condition of your body in the present moment, continue asking yourself, "Is this body me? Is there no difference between my body and me? Am I this body?" Sooner or later you will have an experience. It will be more profound than a thought, an idea, an opinion. You will have the experience that you do not know. You will also experience the fact that your body needs your love. You take care of your body by loving it. You destroy the body by disliking, loathing or hating it.

You will find further that loving your body comes naturally, like a parent loving his child or a pet-owner loving his pet. It comes more naturally than a car-owner loving his car or a worker loving his job.

Ask yourself, "Is this who I am?" while you think about where your body came from. Are you the mixture of sperm and ovum emanating from your parents' bodies? If you can imagine your body in that first stage of life, are you the one imagining it or are you what you are imagining? Perhaps the only time you are what you imagine yourself to be is when you imagine yourself to be imagining something!

Or maybe, just maybe, you are nothing but the awareness of it all: aware of what you are imagining, aware of the act of imagining, aware of the experience of your body, aware of the sense of yourself as an "I".

We have been referring to ourselves as our body for so long that we have hypnotized ourselves into believing that the body is who we really are. But the body is a gift. It is a wonderful instrument through which you function and perceive in the physical world. The body is our home. It is our vehicle. It is our natural instrument. You begin to see this more and more clearly the more you ask yourself the question: "Am I this body?"

You see that the body is something to care for, to enjoy, even to adore. It is something to feel grateful for. When you feel sick or in physical pain, that is not easy to do. Sometimes, you can be in such physical pain, that the body feels like nothing but a burden and you are ready to give it up. It is no longer working as an instrument through which you can function in this world. It becomes its own torturer.

Going through periods of pain, even extreme pain, can be good for you. It teaches you to respect the body and its limits. It teaches you to really appreciate the body when it is in good working condition. It can also teach you courage, patience, endurance while you are going through the pain, waiting for it to end. It can help you to recognize the real source of all your fear, which is your thinking, and thus help you to let your fear go and to loosen your attachment to the thoughts that bring on fear. It can help you to get free from domination by your thinking mind.

As you achieve that freedom you don't have to think about what you do not want to experience. Since you experience what you think about this gives you more control over your destiny. You can let go of thoughts that don't work. You can let go of thoughts of a life that does not work. You can let go of beliefs and opinions that masquerade as truth. You can let go of the idea that you have to prove yourself, get people to treat you with respect. You can let go of thoughts about what other people think about you. You can stop struggling to prove yourself as someone special even in your own eyes.

Take care of your body. But stop trying to "be somebody", even in your own eyes. Just try to be conscious of what is really going on in this very instant. What is really happening? You will find yourself being led, led into peace, joy and love. The guidance comes through feeling. You will feel the sense of inner peace drawing you, of conscious inner peace. Allow yourself to go in that direction. Stop trying to be what you are not. All you are really looking for is the freedom to simply be yourself in the now. And then, who knows, you will probably find yourself respected, appreciated, and admired for being so humble!