Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Who Is Me?

I am no Borges but I have been inspired by his stories today. I was minding my own business at home without much to do and left my bed room to go to the computer. I walked slowly and suddenly I saw someone sitting at my computer with his back towards me. I was caught by surprise and hesitated for some moments without deciding to go on or stop my walk.

The computer room is across from my bedroom and it is just a short walk. I realized that I was alone and how could someone be at my computer. I did not want to call him because I did not know who to call and by what name. So finally I decided to slowly to walk to my computer and sometimes it seemed it was taking forever to walk eight to ten feet and at the same time it seemed it was not taking time at all. I seemed unafraid and I did not feel that the person sitting in my computer was dangerous at all.

However, by the fact that I walked slowly showed that there was some caution on my part although I was not aware of any fear as I said. The caution maybe was because I felt that something very important was about to happen and I did not know what. I had no idea about what was about to happen but I had a sense that it would be tremendously important to my life and perhaps for the life of that person I was about the meet.

So as I walked many thoughts crossed my mind and what was supposedly to be a second had taken almost a life time, I felt. The person seems so concentrated in what he was doing and did not seem to see me approaching.

I was at that moment walking on my toes and everything seemed so silent that you could hear an ant walking if one happen to pass by. In such state of silence one almost get lost as if he is not himself anymore. I was as if I was walking on air without touching the ground and no wonder, I thought, when I realized it, that the person in front of me had not heard my footsteps.

By this time I was very close to him and undecided to touch his shoulder or not. He looked so familiar that I began to think if there was another version of me running around this house without me knowing it. What I thought and I said to myself was how could another me be walking around this house and sitting at my computer, a computer I felt was not exclusively mine anymore because there was someone using it when I was not around. Even if it was me I did not know that me.

It was really odd, I thought. However I don’t have any secrets in the computer so I don’t mind anyone working on it and even going through my stuff. I guess lately I have been losing interest in secrets and in my own possessions. What bother me a bit was that he was doing something in my computer without my permission and that brought the attachment to my possessions as if they belonged to me when in reality nothing belongs to us although we very often think so. We are delusional with thoughts of ownership which only distract us because everything of the world belongs to the world and to no oneself. As Jesus said give to Caesar what belongs Caesar and give to God what belongs to God. No wonder Jesus walked this planet with no fear whatsoever and even his body he gave to Caesar.

I realized finally with all this I was just delaying for some unknown reason the inevitable meeting that was about to happen at that exact moment. All this time that person never looked back or made a move to look back in my direction in any form or shape. I wondered if he was deaf and could not hear all the voices which I finally realized was only in my head and for sure could not be heard by him. But then I realized if he was me or one part of me, he should have heard by now all the dialogue in my head.

As there was no pressure and no hurry in my part, I began to be more aware of what was going on. I began to realize again and again that I was traveling out of time and space floating in a vacuo beyond my imagination. It was an interesting sensation and could go on forever and I could perhaps never meet the person in front of me.

However that was not my objective because I wanted to know who was finally sitting on my desk, in front of my computer and seemly working on it. I was still undecided when my left hand rose slowly towards the shoulder of that person and stopped in mid air.

I realized then that I had lost control of my body and that there was someone else moving it and he was not myself either. Now things really got strange because there was three of us in the room and I only knew one to be myself something I began to doubt at this point. Did I really know myself? It was a question that came in a flash and passed by quickly with no definitive answer.

So three questions came to mind immediately who is the one moving me? who is myself? and who is the one sitting in front of me? I seemed to have answer for only one question which at that moment, as I said I begin to doubt although until that moment I thought I knew myself well. So with one question partially answered about knowing myself, I had two to answer and it was mind boggling.

Then I thought that the one moving me perhaps was some unknown part of myself until that moment who had done that before I remembered. As this was going on I thought there was a riddle to the whole thing and it was with the person sitting in front of me and I had to turn him around and see who was it.

Finally then my left hand touches his shoulder I thought with such a care and tenderness that I thought he had not felt my touching at all because in reality I am right handed and should have touched his shoulder with my right hand, I thought. So he did not turn around immediately. In these few seconds I thought If I should press my hand strongly upon his shoulder or just wait for him to respond. It took a few seconds before I felt that he was about to move and turn around to allow me finally to look at him in the eyes. At this moment I realized I was anticipating all that was about to happen. I was right I guess he was just taking his time as much as I had taken mine. However those few seconds outside time and space are not the same as the second in time lived in it at all. The best way I can explain it is to say that outside time and space it can take longer or no time at all for something to happen. This seems to be a contradiction but when you are living it, it is not.

When he finally turn around slowly and with no hurry or pressure, I could not believe who I was looking at and I guess you would not believe either. It was with an unsurmountable surprise that I finally realized that the person siting in my computer was myself and that I was looking at my own self in body, mind and everything else. I did not know what to think or what to say. However I thought if this is me, who is me and who is the one moving my body. In that moment everything went pitch black and everything disappeared and left me speechless and without any thoughts or words. There was only a scrap of thought questioning was this real and I could attest to it in flesh as I touched and felt the touch to the shoulder of this person who is supposedly me. So I begin to doubt what is real and what is not although intellectually I can grasp at what is real for question of seconds. However to this day I have no clue what is really real or not. Do you?

Some thoughts came to mind about all this business of what is real and what is not real. If we do know what is real or not and we are sure of it and believe that we do know not only intellectually, there are two possibilities or we are a sage, completely enlightened, or we are in the darkest of our ignorance. If we don’t what is real or not, there are three possibilities: if we don’t know what is real or not, one possibility is that we are out of our minds and lost in delusions like some kind of schizophrenic human wondering without direction asking: Who is me? If we don’t know what is real or not and we don’t know that we know, we are lost with a light on our hands and don’t know we can use it or we don’t know how to use it. One way or another we are lost. If we don’t know what is real and knowing that we don’t know, we do something about it, we are two steps ahead of the pack.

God Bless You,

Antonio