To say that “awareness is aware of itself”
is to split it into two:
one bit as the viewer
and the other as the view.
But is this really so?
(Not according to any teaching
or dogma or philosophy; no,
save me from second-hand ‘truths’!)
What’s the experience right here,
beyond the cunning concepts
that inevitably appear?
Awareness awares.
That’s all that I can say;
its ceaseless unlit light
both creates and acts its play.
Even emptiness is empty
and mind a four-letter word;
my gut rips wide open
as I fall on my sword.
Just this! I cry –
yet instantly it’s clear
that thusness is a step too far
from the lucid living light
that’s plainly shining
h e r e
[~ ml – emmelle – on exiting retreat]
this unlit light 
On Wednesday I was weeping over two unrelated things which I thought I had got over. Then I realised what was really upsetting me was an email I had received five days before, and the other two things related to it tangentially. It was as if I was being led by an unconscious other self, which could only address me in riddles. And the “I” was the conscious bit, being led. If my amygdala and my frontal lobe may have different responses and even different interests, may I not be more than one?
Beautiful Clare – your comment speaks for us all.
“… may I not be more than one?” asks the “I” – and we find we are indeed untold versions of Life as it meets itself. Yet our weeping and upsets, our responses and interests, are all known by the same changeless Knowingness.
Is there any division between the wondrous plenitude of selves that are Known, and the Knowingness of them?
♥
Awareness can only aware ItSelf, because that is all there is. As you say: “its ceaseless unlit light both creates and acts its play.” And evidently/apparently “duality” is its play – Awareness awareing/experiencing ItSelf *through* (awareness of) ItSelf, as not separate from ItSelf, but apparently with the ability to express and experience ItSelf dualistically without losing the Essence of ItSelf… Phew, now that was a mind bender 🙂
Yes! The “fall on my sword” is another way of expressing the “mind bender”. Concepts are strangled, silenced by the paradox of the Play.
Thanks for sharing, dear Christine. ♥