That One Question

Osho has very often reminded us in his discourses of the work of Ramana Maharshi, that the only relevant question in life is the question “Who Am I?” 

 “My effort is not to answer your questions, but to make you aware that out of a hundred questions, ninety nine are simply foolish. Drop them! Once you have dropped the foolish questions - they look very philosophical- the one question remains. That question is no longer concerned about irrelevant, nonessential things. That one question is about Existence, about you, your being. Not why you are here, not about the purpose of your being here, but about your being here - who you are: Who am I?" (Osho: The Search)

 According to Sri Ramana Maharshi, a master whose one method was the use of enquiry,

 "Every living being longs to be perpetually happy, without any misery. Since in everyone the highest love is only felt for oneself, and since happiness alone is the cause of love, in order to attain that happiness, which is one's real nature and which is experienced daily in the mindless state of deep sleep, it is necessary to know oneself. To achieve that, enquiry in the form 'Who am I?' is the foremost means.”

This enquiry into myself arose during my turbulent young adulthood, but at first it did not form itself clearly into that particular question. I became curious to find out what the difference was between my conditioning and me. I had, after all, spent my adolescent years, in London, in a culture that was other that that I was born into. Having been born in Sri Lanka, into a mixed Colonial family, partly European, partly Asian, I not only felt like a misfit in the land of my birth, but also in my adopted homeland. Something got stirred up in me that was deep in the blood. It could have been that my ancestors were voyagers, who travelled long distances, between the west and the east and had felt the same restlessness. It could have been the desire of a troubled adolescent to find a sense of belonging. However this curiosity began, there was an understanding that the phenomenon of conditioning did exist.  

I have made many long journeys in this life, the first of those being the voyage from Colombo to Southampton at the age of twelve. At this age, my parents had to pay full fare for me on the ship. My younger siblings, considered to be children, travelled at a lower fare. That also meant that their meal times were earlier than that of my parents and myself, as I ate with the adults. This, on board ship, meant that I had to dress up, for dinner every night. I remember feeling very grown up in my long trousers. 

 There was one particular night that the ship was on the Red Sea, at the opening of the Suez Canal. There, many traders climbed ropes up to the ship’s open decks and begin to set up their wares for sale. On this night, I was up and about, at an unusually late hour, on my own. My father and mother were both absent from dinner, as they were a bit sea sick, so I wandered the deck amongst the hustle and bustle of the market traders, watching a colourful scene unfold before me quite unexpectedly. Although this scene was unfolding all around me, I was in it but yet at the same time apart from it. At first I could not quite believing that I was in such a reality and perceiving it at the same time. It was, for me, the very first taste of something that I came to learn of as witnessing, of being fully in the movie and noticing everything that was happening at the same time. It felt strangely familiar to me. It was as if I was standing beside myself and observing all that was going on. I could really take note on a sensory level of every part of the action on the ship and in my surroundings.

I can still recall the scene and the sensation, even as I now struggle to find the words that describe it accurately.

 This sensation was one that I was to experience a few years later, after making London my home. Along with my family, I was visiting friends of my parents, on an occasion, which ran later than my normal bedtime. I sat in the midst of activity, surrounded by people in lively conversation, watching the round of conversation and being one step away from it. 

Both of these events were spontaneous. I do not remember talking about them to anyone yet, I was later to discover their significance. 

 “I always ask seekers to ask Who am I? not in order that they will come to know who they are, but only in order that a moment will come when the question is asked so intensely that the questioner is not there, only the question remains .A moment is bound to come when the question is absolutely intense, as deep as it can go, then the absurdity of it is revealed. You can come to know that there is no one who can ask Who am I? or to ask Who are you? The question is asked not to get an answer, but to transcend the question"(Osho: I Am The Gate)

 The course of my life took me into exploring my inner workings through therapeutic tools such as Bioenergetics, Gestalt and Encounter, tools that during that time, in the early 70’s were being used in Europe. At the start of my therapist training years, I participated in a three-day course, known as Enlightenment Intensive, facilitated by its creator, Charles Berner. I have given a full account of this course in one of my previous articles, entitled Essential Moments. It was during this course that I first worked with the question “Who Am I?” as a koan. A “koan” is a Zen term, which applies to a question with an answer that is not to be found in logic, but rather is to be found in a direct experience. It has left a deep impression, as one of the most valuable tools I have learned this lifetime. This three-day process became one of the first to be included in the world of Osho, when the ashram was set up in Pune in the early 70’s. It was a course that Osho himself would recommend to newcomers who would go and see him, as an entry into a direct self-experience and meditation.

This method of working was later to become a main feature of my own work. I still use it to this day, in its three-day form or a seven-day process, known as Satori, whenever the opportunity arises. It is a highly structured process that prepares the ground for insights to happen. In deep contemplation clarity arises. This direct experience of the inner is not easily captured in words. What is expressed is not fully what wants to be expressed.

 “Who am I? is not really a question; hence it can never be answered, neither by others nor by yourself. Then what is it? It is a koan. Who am I? is utterly absurd. By asking it, don't hope that one day you will get the answer. If you go on asking, Who am I? Who am I? — if you make it a meditation, as Raman Maharshi used to say to his disciples…. He used to give only one simple meditation: just sit and repeat, first loudly, then not so loudly, then just in your throat; then even the throat is not to be used, just deep down in your heart let it resound: Who am I? Who am I? Go on asking…."(Osho: Dhammapada Vol 3)

 You do not learn self-inquiry... it is not a technique that you can master to your standards of perfection like visualisation or yoga. Self-inquiry is simply a tool, a question 'Who am I?', that allows you to trace the mind back to its source - and at that point the question itself dissolves into a state of clarity. You do not need to master the thought 'Who am I?' What is there to master about it? It is just asking yourself 'Who am I?', it is that simple! You do not need to master the question or technique because the question/technique itself is not the point, although it is an important tool, rather, just allowing the question to lead you back to the source, to trace the radiance back to its source as Zen Master Chinul puts it. The true source of the radiance is an all encompassing awareness that is upstream from all objects, mind or body… tracing all perceptions to the source by asking ‘Who am I?’ The thought ‘Who am I?’ is simply a pointer, like a finger pointing to the moon, you don’t grasp or look at the pointer, rather let the pointer direct you to look at the moon.

 Ramana Maharshi put it very well by saying: "By the inquiry Who am I?, the thought Who am I? will destroy all other thoughts, and like the stick used for stirring the burning pyre, it will itself in the end get destroyed. Then, there will arise Self-realisation.”

There is a direct experience of truth.

 From my own experience I would say that an investigation, into Who am I? is far from repeating a mantra over and over. A mantra is an instrument of the mind, a powerful sound or vibration that you can use to enter a deep state of meditation. Investigation is a step-by-step reflection of the mental constructions and attitudes that keep us away from sensing and expressing who we essentially are, behind all the roles that we play and the contexts we put ourselves in. This, in other words, is our conditioning. We were not born with these attitudes. This investigation takes us into the core of being... it bypasses the mind and its conceptualizations - any mind made conceptual answer, which rings hollow is to be negated or let go of. All speculations, concepts, ideas have no certainty as they are merely theories of the mind and always have room for doubts - but the essence of being that lies prior to the mind and its conceptualization rings with utter certainty and undeniability.

 In the gaps between thoughts, we are still effortlessly present and aware. Being is nothing inert, it is pure aliveness, presence, clarity, vitality and intelligence. We cannot say that we are not - undeniably, We Are... So what is this? What is this sense of existence and presence? Who am I? The question is simply a tool to turn the light around, so that Awareness withdraws its identification with thoughts and forms... to realize itself, its true identity. The question is not meant to be repeated or recited verbally like a mantra, rather it is simply a non-conceptual exploration, looking, investigating into the fact of being… of existence... Eventually all concepts and ideas and even the question Who am I? subside, and in that thoughtless gap is the realisation of stillness and silence.

 “Once you understand yourself, then there is eternal life. Who bothers about long life? Long life is still a desire of a body identified man who is afraid of death. Death does not happen, it has never happened. It happens because you are identified with the body and you don’t know yourself. Yes, from the body you will be separated. If you know yourself as the witnessing soul, as the consciousness, as the awareness, then there is no death. A man who has attained to his innermost core of being is so full of life, that wherever he moves he showers his life on everything.”(Osho: The Search)