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I AM
Shoshin
No one in particularNowhere Special Veteran
Sometimes "I" think...
I am all
I am Buddhist
I am curious
I am deluded
I am empty
I am full
I am grateful
I am happy
I am ignorant
I am joyful
I am kind
I am lonely
I am mindful
I am noisy
I am optimistic
I am proud
I am quiet
I am right
I am sad
I am tearful
I am undecided
I am victorious
I am wrong
I am xenophobic
I am yearning
I am zero
Am I all of the above? Am I some of the above? Am I none of the above ?
Who am "I" really ?
Hmm perhaps I am really nothing special ... 
3
Comments
Who asked the question? Sound familiar?
I am curious....Who wants to know ?
I am because we are.
Who wants to know wants to know. You're not curious, there is just curiosity.
....Yes "I" am
No "you" aren't.
...Who said that ???
Who wants to know said that, and that's who heard it too.
Welcome to the Not-pissing contest, everyone...
So is Who wants to know and that's who heard it "curious" ?
It came across as a famous comedy routine to me
You don't say
Yup, gotcha. I see what you mean - !
Very much so.
It's actually a cosmic joke.
@Tsultrim and "I" are just having fun/enjoying our selves nothing serious well apart from getting other "I" ams to perhaps think about who they are in the scheme of things...which in a sense is nothing really special ...Just a bundle of selves jockeying for position ...when the mood takes us so to speak
There is no need to jockey for position in emptiness. It's everywhere, so one place is as good as another.
I am, therefore I write.
A different combination of things you've probably already read before, perhaps;
but my existence transcends mediocrity all the same.
You read, and I am manifest;
words, dancing from my fingertips and pirouetting onto the screen,
giving my amorphous soul shape and form.
Words, floating through cyberspace,
drifting towards an unknown destination,
a time capsule of thoughts and emotions to be discovered by you.
Words, screaming 'HERE I AM!'
Subject and object merging together as one;
for at least a fleeting moment, eternity unfolds between the two of us.
Words, consumed by your eyes.
Hopefully enjoyed, maybe despised;
but here I am, naked and bare, unashamed of my humanity,
my insatiable desire to be acknowledged.
It doesn't really matter what I say,
as long as I say it well enough to capture your gaze,
the gaze which validates my being,
and breathes life into my clumsily assembled vicariousness.
I write because I don't want to be alone,
even if my ephemeral companion is unknown and thousands of miles away.
Even in my solitude, I am a social creature it seems.
I write, therefore I am.
Poem in Response to Jason's Poem
I am not, therefore i write
Because i want you to know the same,
Some way to relieve your pain.
No matter what i write
I never have a shape or form
For i am nothingness that knows.
My words scream, "Here I Am Not""
And subject and object are never parted,
Even for a fleeting moment.
I am not here displaying what it really means to be human
For any desire to do so will certainly separate us.
My being is unchanged, validated or not,
For true being is impervious to conditions.
I write because i'm not, and want you to see
There is a way to peace and freedom.
We are all social creatures in emptiness,
Therefore I write so that one day we will meet there.
But there is more than just curiosity. The curiosity in question has a point of origin and was caused by incoming information. The information was received and so the curiosity about the source of information was formulated.
I use labels as handy tools of exploration and expression without needing a permanent identification to cling to but my actions are a different story. These I own.
I may not be a thing in the conventional sense that takes up space but I express qualities as if I were. So I relate to somethingness which could be akin to nothingness except that there is no such thing as nothing. Nothingness then implies qualities which by definition cannot exist or be demonstrated by anything including that which does not exist.
I'll make this short because I'm posted out. You don't own anything. The nothingness I speak of is inseparable from awareness, it's commonly called emptiness or sunyata in Buddhism. It is an experience without an experiencer.
That sounds nice and all but if nothingness is inseparable from awareness then it makes more sense to say awareness and not nothingness. Afterall, the idea is to be ever more aware, not ever more non-existent.
It shouldn't take too much practice to figure out you don't exist since if you didn't exist you couldn't practice anything really, could you?
I do own my actions and so I take full responsibility for them. Cause and effect. My actions can cause pain to myself and others and so it would be wise to put them to constructive use and be mindful of my compassion to wisdom ratio.
Sunyata makes more sense as potential than nothingness to me but then here I am so I could be a bad example.
Maybe somebody that isn't here will have a better take.
I will just reference the Upajjhatthana Sutta for referencings sake. "I am the owner of my actions".
Oh, welcome by the way. If I sound cheeky it's because I am.
Awareness is nothingness. If you don't think so, try to get a glass of it. Ever more aware until you become it. Yes you go through a phase of more nonexistence: nonexistence of self, nonexistence of other and the big nonexistence or emptiness when the nonexistences are seen to be the same.
It takes a lot of practice and an aptitude to see you don't exist. When you don't exist you can practice everything better because ego and duality aren't in the way.
You don't own anything , there's no you. There are actions but no actor. Emptiness has never known cause and effect. We are in the absolute world now, governed by absolute truth. Compassion and wisdom are the nature of that world, and they see to responsible action. We have gone from behavior modification to realization now, from trying to being.
Sunyata is not potential it is the true nature of Mind and reality.
I'm not here and you're getting my take.
That's true until there is no owner.
Hello to you as well. No you're not cheeky, you're nothing and any reference points to you as cheeky or anything else only makes nothingness harder to realize.
Yeah, right. There is no owner' until said owner drops a non-brick on their non-foot, then hops around like some demented non-dunce on a non-pogo-stick cursing said non-brick.
Non?
It's confusing when two channels of a tradition are discussed as one.
Original meets Pseudo-Esoteric.
It's never going to end well.
I do not think, therefore I am not.
Or maybe I am.
A bundle of loosely-tied aggregates.
Who cares?
I am just passing by and enjoying the view
I am in the habit of having my say and when all is said and done
contemplation come back into play -as the ego's overrun
The ego is in the habit of cropping up when least expected and to think otherwise is being ...well egotistical
"I think therefore I am."
So what happens when you don't think?
All these things I write
Are just pale shadows
Rough reflections of thought
Passing through language
And electronics
From my mind to your mind!
There's the problem from where I sit. You figure that if something takes up no space it doesn't exist but emptiness denotes change which denotes potential, not a magic nothing.
In my experience awareness is more akin to somethingness than nothingness. Being aware is not the same as being nothing but I could see being no thing in particular. Potential means anything is possible if conditions allow but nothing means absolutely nothing. No illusion, no anything.
But you seem pretty sure of yourself so I'll leave you to your non-existence where that which doesn't exist must argue the point.
Really, you aren't, but you mistakenly believe that you are. Whether you think or don't think doesn't change that fact.
From a Buddhist insight standpoint Descartes was way off.
I see you come from a long lineage of seekers (242). Keep going.
Hi Kerome, your short poem stimulates me to do one myself.
All these things i write are messages from emptiness
And are themselves empty.
They arise from no one and are sent to know one.
Nothingness that knows creates them
And they pass through nothingness
To nothingness that understands them.
The empty awareness that we are is naturally kind and caring
And its messages are well understood by their recipients.
There is a smile, warmth, and things continue as they always are
Always have been and always will be.
I don't think it's too far off.
What is this "I, me, mine" other than a mere thought with no substantial essence?
I don't have a self, the assurance comes from the experience of mind's true nature (woae). It's like if i asked you about what's in your living room when you weren't there, and you looked with the mind's eye and said, "Well i have my chair, my hookah and my bearskin rug." Yes indeed, but rather than argue i prefer to clarify the point.
Like the barely understandable messages after a TV ad that protects the companies from law suits, i would like to say, a bit more legibly, what is going on with these comments of mine.
First, although said differently at times, they do not differ from the words of my teacher Chogyam Trungpa, Rinpoche or other respected teachers of the Kagyu, Nyingma and Zen traditions. I invite you to read the Rain of Wisdom, dohas by past teachers in the Kagyu lineage as a start, and of course the vast, profound literature of Chogyam Trungpa, Rinpoche.
Secondly, my comments come from the absolute world governed by absolute truth, where emptiness, self existing awareness, nonduality, loving kindness are the norm. For those who don't share that world the words can be mystifying or to some absurd. They are not meant to obfuscate however, but to describe the nature of the absolute world. The words used are our first tongue from a place that is our ancestral home.
If we wish to return to that home we must have a great teacher, enlightenment in the flesh, authentic enlightenment teachings, and a sangha that is devoted to the teacher and teachings, as well as a good deal of luck, some may call it karma.
Thank you @ David for the excellent questions,cheekiness can be a good thing in the Dharma. Some of us have bet our lives on it and it helps in getting to the truth.
"I" too at times might talk out my ass
But as with all things anicca... this too shall pass
At times...
I am ignorant
I am deluded
But for the most part...
I am empty
For which I am grateful
Tsultrim sometimes you come across as quite condescending. Have I got it wrong?
I hope so @Socair.
At times "I" (also) think ...
I am Condescending
I am Hopeful
Hmm... more to add to the list of "I Ams"
The list that "I" am (so it would seem) is never ending...I am gobsmacked ...
Gobsmacked?? @Shoshin ! Why? Do tell?
Are we still on topic.......?
I AM
"I" seem to go on and on and on and on... like a never ending story
You are lovely @shoshin. ??? I AM certain of that.
@federica and @Shoshin does an I AM incorporated into a post on this thread automatically keep it on topic?
Just askin' for a friend..:D
I would say yes....I am happy with that
i am tired.
busy working,
sharp and focus,
to make that money.
buddhist practice paying off.
intention,
energize ,power through,finish strong.
the day is long,
but the sleep is good.
good night or good day,
whereever you are.
peace,praise enlightenment and work(mind,body,breath).
The more "I am" thinking about how "I am" mentioned, the more insignificant I am becoming...I am (so it would seem) cropping up everywhere...in all kinds of situations and conversations
"I" guess it helps 'me' to see/understand that "I am" not a permanent unchanging entity. and just like a chameleon changing colours to suit its background..."I am" changing all the time to suit the environment that "I" find my "self" in... so to speak...
Just some food for thought to contemplate
Most of us, well I am, are aware of 'dependent arising' ...
http://www.buddhanet.net/e-learning/depend.htm
As the import of essence grasping increasingly dissolves, not into nothing, that is zombie or Alzheimer mode, we increasingly become aware of a sense or state of non-being.
Nun or none-being is an ideal of Dharma. The Buddhist tradition describes this as Buddha (awake).
Being awake means I am not, everything else is I am knot, auspicious.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endless_knot