Questioning your beliefs

Preparing by questioning one's beliefs

• Take the common belief of reading. One might say with surety that 'I am reading this article'. But what does one really mean by reading? There is the perception of the sense of sight, which simply conveys the changes in contrast, pattern and colour. The mind assigns a meaning to the assembled picture, based on childhood learnings about which patterns mean which letters of English alphabet. The mind further assigns meaning to groupings of these letters, words and sentences. To one not familiar with the English alphabet, these would remain interesting light patterns. So, what one really means in saying 'I am reading this article' is that 'I am aware of the sense of sight and the mind assigning a certain meaning to what is perceived'.
• If one says 'I'm watching/hearing a person sing', what one really means is that one is aware of the sense of sight, sense of hearing and the meaning being assigned to the combination of the two, creating the impression of someone singing. For one not knowing the language, the song is devoid of any meaning except the music.
• One concludes one is speaking by seeing/perceiving the movement of the tongue and the lips, vibrations in one's vocal chords and perceiving the sense of hearing that one's mind puts together as meaningful speech, or the notion that 'I am speaking'.
• Notice how the senses in themselves do not convey any meaningful information, it is the mind that makes up the meaning.
  
• One is aware of the world only by one's senses, for if one were not, the world would not exist for him.
• One knows that one has a body, only by perceiving it through one's senses.
• When one is asleep, the senses shutdown and there is no world from one's perspective, nor is there any happiness, worries, relationships, space or time. There are no parents, spouses, children or enemies either.
  
• When one 'wakes up', the sense of 'I am' awake comes back, the senses function again, and the world with all its problems exists again.
• The world only appears when your body appears.
  
• You are always aware of all these perceptions, the awareness of seeing, hearing, thinking, smelling, tasting.
• All these indicate that you always exist as awareness, irrespective of the transient nature of any of the sensory perceptions or thoughts, feelings and emotions. That awareness is always with you, while the world around you, including your body changes constantly, but the sense of 'I' never changes
  
• Only the changeless can be aware of the changes. You are certain that change is the only certainty in the world, but how would you be aware of that unless there was something changeless from which the sense of 'I' emerges ?