Who Am I? The Most Important Question to Ask When You Meditate
“There is but one cause of human failure. And that is man's lack of faith in his true Self.” — William James
Many people who begin a meditation practice have questions about it and they tend to be focused on how to do it. People want to know which technique to use and how to use it. They also want to know how it works, what they can expect, and what the benefits will be. These are very important questions and of course you do need to find out these things, but they are not the most important question. “Who am I when I meditate?” is the most important question that a new meditator should ask because who you think you are when you meditate is more important than how you do it.
Radical Change Is Possible
Most of us have learned to be victimized by who we are. We see ourselves as a particular person, with certain qualities and characteristics. We are good at some things and bad at others. Of course, we can grow, but only so much and so fast, and only with a great deal of effort. We are a someone, a something, a lump of clay that can be molded, but we will always be that same lump of clay underneath.
What we don’t realize is that radical change is possible. We don’t have to be the person we always have been. We can be different, not just the same person with different qualities and characteristics, but a different person. And this change doesn’t need to take a long time or involve arduous work.
The truth is that we are all capable of doing more than what we think we can. We are stronger than we think, smarter than we think, and more beautiful, graceful, and sensitive than we think. We have greater capacity for compassion and we can love much more than we know. Of course, we can also be more cruel, more thoughtless, and more selfish than we would like to think.
We are all human and we have the full range of human potential locked inside us. So why do we only manifest in some ways and not others? Why do there seem to be limits to what is possible for us? What is it that unleashes or suppresses our higher potentials? What allows us to manifest in ways that are loving, kind and benevolent, or moves us to be selfish, cruel, and destructive?
Identity Creates Reality
The key to unlocking your inner potential is in your identity because your identity acts like a kind of cognitive DNA that tells you what you can do and who you are. It is a collection of ideas and assumptions that you experience as facts about who you are. These ideas and assumptions came from two sources, things you were told about yourself, and things you concluded about yourself. Either way, they became boundaries that dictate what is and is not possible for you.
If you are identified with a particular self-image, what is possible for you will be limited by that self-image. If you believe you are a person who cannot earn money, you will always struggle with money. If you believe you are unlovable you will continually find evidence that proves that you are.
“Believe that life is worth living, and your belief will help you create the fact.” — William James
As you change the way you see yourself, you change what is possible. William James, the great American philosopher, and psychologist wrote about this using the phrase the will to believe.
James saw that we all have “the will to believe.” That means we have the freedom to choose which ideas we trust and live by. And because these ideas shape our actions and lead to consequences, we must take responsibility for whatever we are choosing to believe, especially about ourselves.
Who Is Meditating?
I have taught meditation and mystical philosophy for over twenty years and along the way I realized that the question of who we believe we are when we meditate is equally, if not more important, than the question of how we should practice.
As a meditator I struggle as many do with the problem of falling asleep. Every time I would sit to do my practice I would almost immediately start dozing off. One day, out of sheer frustration, I decided to meditate throughout the entire night to prove that I could stay awake.
I remember walking up to my meditation cushion at about 11:00 pm ready to meditate for the next seven hours. My body was tense. I was mentally and emotionally preparing for what I knew was going to be a tremendous struggle with myself. I felt ready for the battle although somewhat apprehensive.
Just before I sat down to the first session a thought crossed my mind. “You are assuming this is going to be hard.” I realized it was true. Suddenly I saw that preparing for a struggle ensured that a struggle was going to occur. I was effectively anchoring myself in a belief that meditation was hard for me, and it would be difficult to stay awake.
I saw clearly that I didn’t have to do that. If I could prepare for my meditation to be hard, I could just as easily prepare for it to be easy. As I sat down, I consciously decided to relax and allow myself to feel a sense of joyful anticipation at the prospect of spending the next seven hours comfortably meditating.
To use William James’ phrase, I was exercising my will to believe. I was choosing to believe that I was someone who found it easy to remain alert and relaxed in meditation. I was no longer the person who struggled to stay awake. I had willed myself into a new identity and it worked. I sat all through the night without needing to struggle at all. It was easy for me to stay awake.
My meditation practice has never been the same again because after that I always paid attention to who I thought I was before I sat down to meditate. As time went on, I began to change who I chose to be when I practiced. I didn’t just want to be someone who could easily stay awake. I wanted to be a person who had easy access to higher consciousness and the breakthrough experiences we have there. I adopted the belief that I was that type of person and breakthrough experiences became consistently available for me.
There is likely to be a part of you that finds this hard to accept. You can’t just choose to be someone that you are not, after all. You must be the person that you are. This brings up the all-important question, who are we? We’ve been told a lot of things and we’ve drawn a lot of conclusions about ourselves, but who says those ideas and conclusions are right? Why do we have to be that person? Why can’t we choose to be someone else?
Meditation is a wonderful arena to experiment in. The next time you meditate, decide to meditate as someone that finds meditation easy and fruitful. No matter who you’ve imagined yourself to be up until then, you can decide to be different. Meditate as a person who is adept at the practice and see the difference that makes.
One last note, this may feel strange at first, but this way of practicing has long standing precedent in mystical work. In Tibetan Buddhism for instance practitioners take on the identity of a god or goddess and meditate as that entity to absorb the qualities of that being into their own self. Perhaps we are doing the same. Maybe when we meditate as someone who is easy and peaceful, we become easier and more peaceful ourselves, and on the other hand, perhaps when we meditate as someone who is fearfully preparing for battle, we absorb those qualities into who we are as well.
Try meditating as an ideal version of yourself and see how it feels. You can always go back to being the person you were before if you want to, but I doubt you will.
