Same Consciousness
02 Oct 2012

RIGHT NOW, in this moment, you have the same consciousness as the Buddha, Jesus, Krishna or indeed any 'enlightened' master you can think of. The very same consciousness or awareness. What a blessing! The only difference is the conditioning of the mind which we allow to eclipse this consciousness, to distract us from the natural awakened state that is always there.

So next time you are confused or upset about something, consider this. You awareness of your confusion and your emotional turmoil is the very same awareness that the greatest masters of life who have ever been incarnate. You are facing your challenges with the same awareness that someone like the Buddha or Jesus faced his challenges with.

We know that different people see different things because they have different realitymaps that filter perception. Two people may look at the same red ball and see something quite different, because of difference in the eyes, the way the brain decodes the signals and the conceptual associations including memory. But what about the awareness of those different perceptions? The awareness is identical because it itself has no characteristics by which to compare. Awareness is awareness; one person's awareness is the same awareness as another person's. Awareness is what links us together… it is the unifying experience. Indeed, awareness is our primary experience; everything else is predicated on it.

But a problem arises when we use terms like 'thing' or 'it' with regards to awareness because such terms imply an independent existence outside of consciousness. Calling a thing a 'thing' is a shorthand way of saying that it has characteristics that are independent of consciousness. But this is never the case as nobody has ever experienced anything independent of consciousness. So when we refer to this awareness that unifies experience, we have to realize that a verb is preferable to a noun in any description of it because it is a process rather than a thing. So perhaps we should the term 'awareize'. But using a verb is not quite right either as a verb implies a subject, whereas in this case awarizing is happening all by itself — there cannot be a subject because any idea of a subject is an assumption. After all, if awareness is the primary experience then trying to find 'who' or 'what' is aware only uncovers more awareness. When no 'object' exists there can be no 'subject'.

Some of you reading this will think that this is just philosophy — playing with ideas. But if you are determined enough to really look for yourself, to examine how this thing we call reality arises in mind and how "self" is just an assumption in all of this, then you will find that this goes beyond philosophy, offering a way to see the radiant awareness that underlies all phenomena and all "objects" — experiencing the sweet taste of unity.