“Since the soul is born of divine creation, it carries this questioning in its essence so as not to get lost.”From El refugio del corazón
The power of devotion inside of you cannot be explained through words: it is pure joy, veiled by enigma. How would you explain the sweetness of sugar? How would you be able to enjoy it if you were unable to taste it? I will tell you how I discovered the sweetness of God.
On one of my trips I was able to make my way to Egypt and meditate inside the Great Pyramid, on the stone of the sarcophagus. Inside it was pitch dark, and the silence was deafening. In the middle of the meditation, I saw how the walls were beginning to take on a violet shade.
Later, back at the hotel, I wanted to keep meditating. At one point, a power stronger than my will brought all my attention to my heart, where I felt my presence settling. And there, at the center of my chest, I began to see a blue pearl spinning at an astonishing speed.
That pearl was my intellect at its most subtle level, and as it spun it kept asking itself: Who am I? Suddenly I felt Consciousness answer from within, in a deep voice: You are.
With that answer the pearl would stop in its tracks, and I would be filled with an indescribable ecstasy; all doubts cleared away. Then it would start spinning again and asking: Who am I? And the answer remained the same: You are. It was a conversation between Consciousness and the intellect, at a very subtle level, in which I was connecting with my intellect, seeking to realize its true essence.
At that time I had not read anything about that blue pearl; I simply lived it. That experience marked me deeply and was a step on my path. These experiences were not imposed on me or taught to me by anyone: they came spontaneously, thanks to the Divinity.
A question that comes from the Divinity
This questioning is so pure that it arises from the very intention of the Divinity, to make sure that the soul will want to return home. It is the natural restlessness with which we were all created, so that we would discover our true essence.
But as we become denser, we forget and ignore our true intellect, which asks itself from the most subtle level of ourselves: Who am I? And yet that is where our attention should be focused, on what really matters: knowing ourselves and being able to challenge ourselves.
How could you be sure you know anything, when you don't even know who you are? Asking yourself this question allows what is primal, knowing who you are, to impose itself on any other idea. Perhaps it is this very question that has brought you to read these words. It is truly natural for us to set out on this search.
When the question tasted like cardboard
This question has traveled a long road with me. In my first years of meditation I asked myself questions like “Who am I?” or “What is God?” There was a doubt in my heart and a thirst that grew more intense every day. The questions kept welling up, like water gushing from a spring.
Over time I repeated the question so much that it tasted like cardboard to me, like chewing gum that had completely lost all its flavor. It was still something mechanical.
Until, at one point, it stopped being a repetition. It began to arise from the most subtle fields of my soul, and sometimes I would wake up in the night feeling my own intellect, not my mind, asking itself over and over: Who am I?
The mind asks, the heart answers
Every time you ask the mind who you are, it is your own intelligence that asks the question and, even if the answer is that you are Consciousness and Spirit, that answer is still just a concept. But when you ask yourself the question fully aware of your surroundings, you find the void where the truth dwells: presence and Consciousness, not as a concept of words, but as the experience of its essence.
When thoughts are not active, answers come straight from the presence. Then you understand that you are no longer sitting on the chair of your head, but in that of your own heart.
The ideas created by your mind have no meaning in themselves, as they are anchored to the abstract thoughts of that imaginary person. So, instead of dwelling on giving them meaning, ask yourself who this I is that wants to know, who this I is that thinks it knows, and whether it has any substance on its own. You will find out that this I is actually nobody, even though the idea of it is persistent. Everything that surrounds your name is a handful of thoughts and ideas.
You are
When you know what you are, there is no doubt. There are no versions of you anywhere: it is your own Being, being.
No matter how many concepts you have believed in or how many experiences you have been through, all of it is information. The only thing that truly matters is that you are still you. And the one who delights in living this experience of silence, of peace, of being free of thoughts, is you.
My insatiable desire to know myself led me to all these experiences, which does not mean that you cannot have revelations like the ones I have had. You and I are not different, and such revelations are available to everyone. You do not have to travel or look for gurus: all of that was only part of what I needed to live, learn, know and remember. For you, all it takes is to stop your mind for an instant and turn toward yourself, because there you will find this magical mystery. Go deep within yourself, ask yourself fervently, “Who am I?” and the truth will reveal itself to you, in a way that is yours alone.
From Dr. Zuluan Orion's books: El refugio del corazón · Illumination · Deshojando el Corazón de la Eternidad