Perceive This

So, what is the self? So, is the self your ideas? Or, is “self” the way you perceive the world? You can perceive it any which way you like it—it’s not going to change the world. It will be. It has been marching at a rhythm for a very, very long time. Do you know how big this stuff is out there?

Perceive? Perceive? Next time you are stuck in a traffic jam and the traffic is moving really slowly, remember this. You are on planet Earth, going at a speed, (around, around, around), of 1,040 miles an hour—and, around the sun at a whopping speed of a little over 67,000 miles an hour, (67,042).

Are you hungry for speed? Are you a speed demon? And this is what the cops should be telling people who speed too much—it’s like, “Sir, do you really want to be going that fast? Because, do you know how fast you’re really going?”

So then, what is the self? What?! “Yeah, well, you know, I…I have…I have over the years gotten to know myself. And…and…and sometimes I get mad, and most of the time, I’m okay. And....” You think that’s the self? You think that’s the self? Interesting question, huh? You’ve heard, “Oh, you should know yourself. ‘Know thyself.’” What is the self?

“I”—and “am,” which denotes existence. “I” and “am.” What is this “I”? Do you know? And because you don’t know, anybody can come and give you an idea—“I think you are” ... da-da-da-da, da-da-da—and that’s what triggers.

“Oh yeah, I, uh, I read—I read....” That’s one of our weaknesses: if we read it in a book, it has to be the truth. How did that happen?

Then the self is this be-ing that has the capacity to know that there’s something more going on here. The beauty, the power of that divinity of this entire universe in action, this earth spinning with you on it, with this breath going in and out of you—with a heart that has been in you wanting to be fulfilled, to the simplest of those things.

Is there anything more? And it doesn’t need glorification. This story of the human being just simply needs to be told.

– Prem Rawat