The Greatest Secret

Jan Frazier, from When Fear Falls Away

This is your life with The Greatest Secret. This is your destiny.

CHAPTER 2

THE GREATEST SECRET: REVEALED

“So close you can’t see it.

So subtle your mind can’t understand it.

So simple you can’t believe it.

So good you can’t accept it.”

Loch Kelly, from Shift into Freedom regarding the Shangpa Kagyu Tibetan Buddhist tradition

Why is it so few have discovered the truth? Why haven’t the majority of us realized who we are? How can billions of people have missed something so vitally important to our happiness?

We’ve missed discovering The Greatest Secret because of one small obstacle: a belief! Just a single belief has prevented us from making the greatest discovery we can make. That belief is that we are our body and our mind.

You Are Not Your Body

“We came into this world to be a body in order to learn that we are not a body.”

Lester Levenson, from Happiness Is Free, volumes 1–5

Just as you use a car to get from one location to another, your body is a vehicle you use to move around and to experience the world.

“If you have a car, you do not say you are the car. Why then, if you have a body, do you say you are the body?”

Lester Levenson, from Happiness Is Free, volumes 1–5

Being material, your body isn’t conscious. It doesn’t know it’s a body, but “you” know it’s a body. Your toe doesn’t know it’s a toe, your wrist doesn’t know it’s a wrist, your head doesn’t know it’s a head, and your brain has no idea it’s a brain, but “you” know each and every part of your body. How could you be the body when you know all the different parts, and yet not one of them knows you?

It’s probing questions like these that enabled the great beings of the past to unravel the mystery behind who we really are.

“The worst habit we have gotten into over the millenniums is that we believe we are this body.”

Lester Levenson, from Happiness Is Free, volumes 1–5

“We have forgotten what we are, and we have identified ourselves with objects. I am this body, therefore I’m going to die.”

Francis Lucille

“You fear that if the body isn’t, you are not.”

Lester Levenson

Believing you’re just your body creates the biggest fear of humanity, the fear of death: when your body dies, you fear you will no longer exist. It’s like a dark cloud hanging over your life.

“If you want immortality—stop holding on to the body.”

Lester Levenson, from Happiness Is Free, volumes 1–5

It’s good news that you’re not your body, because your body is going to come to an end one day, as all material things do. The world is completely made up of material things, and not one of those things will last, including your body, which appears and disappears through the process of birth and death. What you actually are never dies!

“What you truly are cannot die. The body will die, but the body is not what you are.”

Mooji

“We have free will to identify with the body or identify with who we really are. Body equals pain and what you are equals infinite joy.”

Lester Levenson, from Happiness Is Free, volumes 1–5

Your way out of all difficulties begins with letting go of the belief that you are your body.

You Are Not Your Mind

The voice in your head is not you, yet you’ve probably believed it is you for most of your life. While the voice in your head sounds like you, seems to know a lot about you, and has become very familiar to you, it’s definitely not you. That voice in your head is your mind, and you are not your mind.

“The mind is a collection of thoughts that constantly appear and disappear.”

Peter Lawry

“If there are no thoughts, then there is no mind. Mind is only thought.”

Lester Levenson, from Happiness Is Free, volumes 1–5

Check for yourself. Where is your mind if there is no thought? Your mind isn’t there.

“There’s nothing inside but thoughts and feelings, memories and sensations, but are you a thought? Are you a feeling?”

Rupert Spira, from a public talk

If you were a thought—let’s say, a frustrated thought—then you would disappear when the frustrated thought disappeared. You are not a thought, a sensation, or a feeling, because when they end you would end too, but you’re still here after they end. You are here before a thought, you are here before a feeling or sensation, and you remain perfectly intact after they’ve gone. It’s fairly obvious when you look at it. Certainly, we do experience thoughts, feelings, and sensations, but we are none of those things.

In some ways it’s easy to understand how we’ve missed seeing who we really are, because the body and mind are a very convincing combination. Our mind keeps up a constant tirade of thoughts, most of which include the word “I,” as though the mind is us. And you may be surprised to learn that all our bodily sensations come from the mind, too, which reinforces our belief that we are our body.

“How others see you contributes to your sense of self. When things happen, they seem to happen ‘to’ you, or you may bring them about … You care what happens because of its effect on you. You ‘hold’ yourself with a wish to keep yourself safe and in a good light. You certainly do seem real.”

Jan Frazier, from The Great Sweetening: Life After Thought

It’s not that you don’t have a body and a mind; it’s just that they are not the real you. Just like your car, they’re simply finely tuned instruments you’re using to experience the material world.

“Identifying with the body and mind is the only thing that is covering up who you truly are. It’s this misidentification that is veiling your true Self.”

Mooji

Are You Really the Person You Think You Are?

“Considering all the effort given to bolstering the ego—the emphasis on self-esteem, reputation, achievement, physical appearance, material acquisition—it’s a miracle awakening ever happens at all.”

Jan Frazier, from The Freedom of Being

The ego, the imagined self, the pretend self, the separate self, and the psychological self are a few of the names that teachers and sages have given for our mistaken identity. All of these descriptions refer to a body and a mind that together make up what we call a person. When we refer to ourselves, most of us are referring to this person that we think we are.

“A person is what you experience, it is not what you are.”

Mooji

“There’s no such thing as a person. If you say, ‘I’m a person,’ then you have to say which one—there was a baby once upon a time, there was a teenager, there was a toddler … and then this whole process will be over soon.”

Deepak ChopraTM, M.D.

Your personality is constantly changing, so if your personality is you, which person are you? Are you the angry person, the loving person, the frustrated person, the irritated person, or the kind person? You probably think you’re all of them, but you can’t be all of them because if you were, the angry person would never disappear; it would always be here. Or if the frustrated person were really you, when the frustrated person disappeared, a bit of you would disappear with it. But that doesn’t happen, does it? You’re here before the angry person appears, and you’re here after the angry person disappears. You’re here before the frustrated person appears, and you’re here after they disappear. Clearly you are not your changing moods or personality.

“Personality is a useful tool, but it cannot define who you are. Who you are lies far beyond who you think you are.”

Jac O’Keeffe

“The biggest obstacle to discovering the truth of who we essentially are is the belief that I am a cluster of thoughts, memories, feelings and sensations. Together these form an illusory self or entity. The belief that I am this entity is the only obstacle. All our psychological problems are due to this imaginary self. It always comes down to mistaking ourselves for this.”

Rupert Spira, from a public talk

“The person only seems to exist because of the persistent and unquestioned belief that there is an actual ‘person’ here. But the person, or ego, can’t exist without the belief in it. It’s only imagination. In truth, there’s no person at all. The only resident of this house of the body is the pure Self, which is what you are. The rest is all made up. There are not two tenants in this body, there’s only ever been one. Belief in ego gives a sense of reality, but this is not a fact, only a fiction.”

Mooji

What’s the problem with believing we’re an ego or a person?

We feel small and extremely vulnerable. We’re afraid of bad things happening to us. We’re afraid of illness, getting old, and dying. We’re afraid of losing the things we have, and not getting the things we want. We live in a state of lack, believing there’s “not enough”: not enough money, not enough time, not enough energy, not enough love, health, or happiness, and not enough life. And even worse, we believe we’re not enough. None of this is true—in fact, it is the very opposite of the truth—but we can never have true lasting happiness while we hold on to the belief that we’re only a person.

“The tragedy and comedy of the human condition is that we spend most of our lives thinking, feeling, acting, perceiving and relating on behalf of an illusory self.”

Rupert Spira, from The Ashes of Love

“The ego isn’t who you are. But it makes so much racket you can’t hear who you really are. If you keep it going, if you feed and water the ego, it’s madness.”

Jan Frazier, from Opening the Door

“I think everyone is suffering from person poison … living life

too personally, perceiving life too personally, taking things too personally. When you’re responding to life in a personal mode it is a form of blindness. You don’t see things in their correct light.”

Mooji

You are most certainly experiencing a body, experiencing a mind, and having the experience of being a person, but these are actually the least parts of you, and ultimately they are not you, because when they end, you do not end.

“There is ‘no people’ in people.”

Shakti Caterina Maggi

But there is a real you.

“Why is it so hard to see through the ego, to let it go—to stop believing in the solidity of the little guy? Why do we hold on to this apparently real self, when beneath and around and above and swimming all through it is this gorgeous other reality that really is real, that can be counted on for sustenance, for perfect peacefulness? Why deny ourselves this, for the sake of something so paltry by comparison—for a thing that causes so much trouble, even pain?”

Jan Frazier, from Opening the Door

Big Pretenders

Your thoughts, feelings, sensations, and beliefs seamlessly work together to convince you you’re a person. We’re all big pretenders. We’re pretending we’re very small. We’re pretending we’re very limited. We’re pretending we’re a small, limited person who is born, lives for a time, dies, and that’s the end of us. But nothing could be further from the truth!

“We are self-obsessed with an imaginary character that doesn’t exist.”

Shakti Caterina Maggi

We could say that this imaginary character is exactly like a movie character. We know the actor playing the character exists, but does the movie character know that the actor exists? No, the movie character is imaginary.

We cement our belief that we’re a person with every thought. If you check on any thought, you’ll find that there’s a “me” at the center of every one of them. Those thoughts centered around the “me” you believe yourself to be affirm over and over again that you’re a little, limited person.

When you believe the voice in your head is who you are, you automatically believe everything it says; you believe all the thoughts that your mind generates.

Thoughts like:

“I’m getting old.”

“I’m too tired.”

“I’m not good enough.”

“I can’t do it.”

“I don’t have enough time.”

“I’m not as healthy as I used to be.”

“I don’t have enough money.”

“I’m not smart enough.”

“My eyesight is not as good as it used to be.”

“I don’t feel loved.”

“He or she doesn’t approve of me.”

“I don’t deserve it.”

“I’m scared of dying.”

“I don’t know what to do.”

These thoughts are all limitations, imposed on you by your mind. Who you really are is unlimited, which means absolutely nothing has power over you!

My teacher says that we’re practicing being small through constant limited thoughts (like the ones I just listed), and if we were not practicing being a small, limited person, we would see the truth of who we really are.

Everything about a “person” is the very opposite of who you really are. The person is imperfect. The real you is perfect. The person is temporary and limited. The real you is permanent and unlimited. The person is born and dies. The real you is never born and never dies. The person is personal and unstable. The real you is impersonal and always stable. The person has changing moods. The real you is constant happiness and peace. The person is full of judgments and opinions. The real you is allowing and accepting of everything. The person gets sick and becomes old. The real you is not subject to aging, and sickness can never touch you. The person suffers. The real you is free of all pain and suffering. The person dies. The real you exists for all eternity.

Trading Unhappiness for Truth

There’s only one way to have a blissful life with lasting happiness, and that is to know your true nature. There’s only one way out of a life plagued with problems, negativity, and discord, and that is to know the truth of who you really are.

“The real you is infinitely grand and glorious, whole, perfect, and in total peace, and you are blinding yourself to this by assuming that you are a limited ego. Drop the blinder, the ego, and be forever in perfect peace and joy. When you have found yourself—you will have everything.”

Lester Levenson, from Happiness Is Free, volumes 1–5

“Life is not about solving lots of little problems because they will never end. Life points us to the one essential thing that has been overlooked—our own true and unchanging self. Mankind as a whole is living largely in the mistaken idea that we are fundamentally a person with a body as opposed to our true Self.”

Mooji

“There may be tragedy in the ‘story’ of our lives, but in truth, there is no tragedy happening to us. Ultimately, the story is only there to teach us this distinction. The moment we take the lesson even the story changes to reveal itself as beauty, love, and intelligence. Do not be attached to the concept that misery is unavoidable. As long as we are attached to this concept, there will be misery.”

Francis Lucille

“In the biblical parable, the man who is identified with the body/mind is the man who built his house on sand. To realize one’s true nature is to build one’s house on rock.”

David Bingham

There’s no search to find the truth because it is what you already are. How could you search for yourself? It’s only that the majority of us have been constantly looking away from our true selves, rather than looking at who we are.

Have you ever looked at one of those pictures where there are two images in the one picture? When you first look at the picture, you can see one image clearly, but at first you can’t see the second image. You try, but the second image seems to elude you due to your focus on the first image.

You have to change your perspective and soften your gaze ever so slightly to see the other image come into view.

In Rubin’s famous picture, at first either you see two people looking at each other, or you see a vase. To see both images clearly you have to shift the way you’re looking at the picture.

For most of our lives we’ve been looking at ourselves from the perspective that we are a body and mind—that we are a person. But to see clearly who we are, just as for Rubin’s painting, we have to shift our perspective—ever so slightly.

The Reveal

Let me ask you one simple question.

Are you aware?

Your answer must be “yes,” otherwise you wouldn’t be aware of the question I just asked you. Let me ask you again.

Are you aware?

Yes, you’re aware. You were aware as a baby, through your childhood, your teenage years, and throughout adulthood. You’ve been aware your entire life.

Awareness is and has been the only constant in your life. Your body keeps changing, your mind keeps changing, thoughts, feelings, and sensations all keep changing, but the one thing that has never changed is your awareness of it all.

And that awareness is who you really are.

You are Awareness.

“You are it. It’s so close you cannot see it. You look through its eyes at the world around you.”

Jan Frazier, from The Freedom of Being

“When we say ‘I,’ we’ve been conditioned to believe that we’re referring to the body, when really ‘I’ is referring to Awareness.”

David Bingham

You are not a body, a mind, or a bundle of thoughts, feelings, memories, or sensations. You are the one who is aware of your body, your mind, your thoughts, feelings, memories, and sensations. You are Awareness itself.

“The moment you meet Awareness something in you recognizes it.”

Mooji

You’re aware of reading this book. You’re aware of the sounds around you. You’re aware of the room you’re in. You’re aware of your name. You’re aware of your body and the clothes on your body, your breathing, and bodily sensations. You’re aware of the roof of your mouth, the soles of your feet, and your fingers. You’re aware of your mind, the thoughts in your head, and your feelings and moods.

In fact, you couldn’t know or experience any of life at all without Awareness.

You Are the Awareness That Is Aware of Everything

Awareness is what is aware of every single life experience you have. It’s not the mind or the body that is aware of your life. You—the Awareness that you are—are aware of the mind, thoughts, and the body, and anything you are aware of cannot be you.

The teacher Sailor Bob Adamson points out that we know we exist—of that we have no doubt. Well, the only way we know that we exist is our awareness that we exist. We make the mistake of believing our awareness that we exist comes from the mind or the body, but that is not true. Our awareness that we exist is what we truly are, not the mind or the body.

Just for a moment, imagine you have no body or mind.

Take away your body.

Take away your mind.

Take away your name.

Take away your life story, which is your entire past.

Take away all memory, beliefs, and all thought.

And notice what is left.

What is left is simply Awareness.

“If someone were to draw our attention to the white paper on which these words are written, we would suddenly become aware of it. In fact, we were always aware of the paper but we didn’t realise it due to the exclusive focus of our attention on the words. Awareness is like the white paper.”

Rupert Spira, from Being Aware of Being Aware

Just like the white paper, Awareness is always present in the background of our life. We usually give our exclusive attention to our mind and thoughts and our body and sensations, because they’re very attention grabbing. But we could not experience the mind and its thoughts or the body and its sensations without Awareness to be aware of them, just as we could not see any words if it were not for the background of the paper the words were printed on.

“Give your attention to this background, even a little, and you will discover a whole new world.”

Hale Dwoskin

“Awareness is the most obvious element of experience and yet the most overlooked.”

Rupert Spira, from Being Aware of Being Aware

“The subtle thing that is overlooked is that everything is known directly by awareness, but it’s assumed that everything is coming in through the mind. For instance, the common thing would be to say, ‘I think,’ but actually, if it’s looked at carefully, it’s noticed that there is an awareness of thinking … so the thinking isn’t who you are; there’s something that is aware of thinking.”

David Bingham, from Conscious TV

The one that is looking out through your eyes is Awareness! The one that is hearing through your ears is Awareness! Without Awareness you wouldn’t be aware of anything you see, hear, taste, smell, or touch, and you would have no experience of the information coming in through your senses. Your senses aren’t aware; it’s Awareness that’s aware of all of your senses.

“The apparatus with which we see is by itself inert, unable to see. A telescope is useless without an astronomer behind it. It doesn’t see anything by itself. Likewise, the apparatus of mind doesn’t see anything by itself.”

Francis Lucille, from The Perfume of Silence

“You are the Awareness that is aware of everything.”

David Bingham

“This individual consciousness—our feeling ‘I am a person, a separate individual, a mind or soul confined within the limits of a body’—is merely an imagination, a false and distorted form of our pure consciousness ‘I am,’ but it is nevertheless the root cause of all desire and all misery.”

Michael James, from Happiness and the Art of Being

“The ‘me’ that we imagine we are is just another thought.”

Kalyani Lawry

“Our real nature, the infinite real self that we are, is simply us minus the mind.”

Lester Levenson, from Happiness Is Free, volumes 1–5

Our mind distorts the world we see by layering veils of thought and belief, one over the top of each other. Each mental veil distorts the world further and prevents us from seeing everything the way it really is.