You Are Not the Body

Akbar & Jeff? No!
Originally uploaded by Seeking Tao

At present you wrongly identify yourself as the body.
Body is given a certain name; that is ‘you’; you consider it to be like that…
I have been very open, very explicit. I’ve been telling you that
you are not the body…
Nisargadatta

Part One:
There seems (broadly speaking) to be two kinds of people in life when a camera is pulled out: those that eagerly jump before the lens and those who flee in terror.

I am a self confessed jumper. I love to have my picture taken. And I am always eager to see the results.
Do I look good? Do I look weird? I am fascinated to find out.
Why?
Well, of course it’s great to have a flattering photo.
But, I’ve come to realize there’s something subtler going on here: I can’t believe I look like that.
“Like that!”

Last year in something of an epiphany I was suddenly struck by, “The camera doesn’t lie.”
Be it good or bad photo – that is how my body looks from that angle, in that light, after that much sleep, and in that wind and those clothes.
Good or weird doesn’t matter.
I look like… That!

What a wonderful discovery. The world is trying to get me to swallow the line that I can actually look like that.
And somewhere deep inside I know so clearly: “I” do not look like “That.”

What do you really look like? Compare the image to how you really feel.
You can try this as a bit of self inquiry:

Surely, I don’t have those squinty eyes? Not like that.
Geeze, I don’t have a head that long and strangely oblong.
I am not like that.
I am more like … what… ?
Nothing at all like That.
Nothing!

Part Two:


This is over nine minutes long, but worth it, I think.
Dean Radin describes experiments testing the relationship between mind and matter. He begins with “intention” experiments and then goes on to “attention” experiments. In these experiments, random number generators are used to test whether collective human attention corresponds to a change in the physical environment. …. It does. Checkout the GlobalOness Project here. It is inspiring.