I Am Aware
Awareness is not a faculty we possess; it is the fundamental reality, the very ground of all being. It is the screen upon which the movie of our lives plays out, the space in which every thought arises, lingers, and dissolves. While the content of our experience changes, the simple fact of being remains.
Unlike the objects of awareness—the sights, sounds, thoughts, feelings—awareness itself has no objective qualities. You cannot see it, touch it, taste it, or measure it. It has no color, no shape, no size. It doesn't appear in the way a thought appears, it doesn't grow old like the body, and it doesn't fade like a memory. It is the non-objective ground that makes all objective experience possible.
To know something is to make it an object of your awareness. Awareness is the subject, the knower of all objective experience. You cannot step outside of awareness to observe it, just as the eye cannot see itself directly.
And yet, despite its non-objective nature, the existence of awareness is the most undeniable fact of our experience. No one can truthfully deny the simple, ordinary knowing of “I am aware.” Even the attempt to deny awareness presupposes the very awareness that is doing the denying. It is the foundational truth upon which all other experiences are built.
Aware presence is ever-present. It is the silent witness to every rise and fall, every coming and going. Recognizing this fundamental truth is essential to our understanding of ourselves and reality.
When we shift our identification from the body-mind to that which knows the body-mind, a very real sense of peace and stability begins to emerge.
This recognition, “I am aware,” or “I am,” is the heart of nondual understanding. It is the unmoving, unchanging reality that contains the seamless flow of life.
In this simple, ordinary, non-objective awareness, we find our true home.