What is Awareness?

July 09, 2009
Awareness is wrt being aware (or paying attention - so attention is another aspect of consciousness) of oneself as well as the contacts one encounters. Being aware of oneself involves the thought processes and the physical state one is in. In addition, awareness means knowing what all you are in contact of. For example, while sitting in a lawn, you are aware of grass, plants, flower pots, trees, state of leaves of plants, the animals like cat, mouse, ants, etc. These contacts are separated by a boundary that limits but does not exclude. So, composite awareness is the fact that you yourself are a part of each contact and each contact is a part of you. But there is a boundary (physical and mental) around each contact, which limits us and does not let us experience the composite awareness, until we are able to sufficiently ground our awareness and pay attention to the current moment.

July 30, 2009
Since past one week, I seem to come to relate to what Philip says 'we all don't have a mind. We are all awareness. Mind is there for us because we think it exists.' This is so true! While walking about 2 days back, I could perceive myself as the space in which every aspect existed. The trees, cars, people approaching, etc. So, at that point of time, I did not feel that I am a separate mind, but all the aspects that I am seeing, hearing, smelling are a part of me - the space. At that point of time, reality seemed to be so simple to me - as though it is nothing to strive for. It simply is! It is so simple that everything is just one me - call it space or awareness. In that oneness, there was love - which was embracing everything.
In fact, simply being in the present moment and being attentive to present moment or observing what is happening in the present moment (whether it is my body movements, my thoughts, beings interacting with me or whatever), I can most readily be my real self. For example, (I don't really say that this has ended, but still has declined) when I am feeling disgusted or irritated or a thought passes by my mind to remind me of something that has happened in the recent past, I now try to set it off - I say to myself that I'll process this thought in a creative adaptive manner instead of reptilian manner, which makes me get submerged into the ocean of thought and the resultant loop of emotions and reactions. At times, I've found that processing the thought in this way, I realize that what has occurred is past. At the present moment, there is no such issue. So, why to hang on with past experience. The present moment is that of peace. So, be in this moment rather than being with thought. This way, loop of the thought is broken and I'm at peace with myself. Even if there is a possibility of worst occurrence in future time, which the thought is trying to tell me, I'll deal with it then - in an appropriate manner, if at all need be. So, why build a mole hill for myself?

But still, I think I submit it to grounding post procedure because until I directly perceive the reality, any impression that my wordly interactions and existence build in my awareness - I will not accept.