You Are Not…

That tricycle was mine when I was two. My dad kept it hanging in the rafters of his garage, and before he died he sent it to me. He taped blocks of wood to the pedals with electrical tape (so I could reach them), and the tape is still intact. It’s been on the bikeport in Arizona sun for 20 years.

“It is only when we forget all our learning that we begin to know.
One must be aware that no thing is what you have taken it to be.”
 -Thoreau

I was sitting quietly on the porch, working on some El Jimador (Reposado), and heard, “what is the most important thing to understand?” A pause, then… “Nothing is how you think it is. If you know nothing is how you think it is, that’s all you need to know.”

If nothing is how we think it is, then there are no beginnings and no endings. Therefore all problems related to time are imagined. Well, that’s a relief… No need to worry about what isn’t happening.

Question everything you’ve learned to believe. 

You are not what you have been told you are.

You are not what you think you are.

Simply… Know you are aware—which does not depend on learned knowledge. 

Indeed, the only thing you can know about yourself that was not acquired from another—that isn’t second-hand knowledge—is that you are present.

Whenever possible, stay with just this: know that you are, and watch living change in every way for the better.

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Between knowing and being there is no gap.