Self-Knowledge and Self-Realization

A Letter: Nisargadatta was my main teaching 8 or 9 years ago and his books were my bibles. And so, I've been doing the I Am meditation since that time. I usually start in the head space on the in breath for "I". Then hold it there and on the out breath allow rest in the "Am"...I also just do shikantaza and focus more in the belly center. Towards the end of my meditations, I will place my hands on the heart and do the "I AM" there and pray for grace/surrender. I typically sit in the morning for 1/2 hour and then in the evening for another 1/2 hour. Sometimes, on my days off, i'll step it up and do a modified sesshin...and sit most of the day... 2-3 years ago, I felt i needed a teacher. Even though i could rest as non conceptual awareness, I was depressed and had a distaste for the world and no motivation to do anything...it became hard to be around family/friends because i felt so divorced from how they saw the world...so, i went to a zen monastery thinking someone would know how to live out this no-self state that i had become stuck in...it was there during a weeklong sesshin that i saw that everything i took myself to be was simply imagination...this quite simply, blew my mind and it came even harder to know how to be in the world after i left the monastery...i then started a contemplative bed and breakfast with my girlfriend focusing on yoga/meditation....this didn't bring in enough $$, so I ended up getting a job working with Alzheimer patients doing therapeutic recreation...this has been a god send and i can do the job with my big toe...but, when i'm not working, i usually just kind of lay around lately... still, i keep reading what other teachers have read or listen to youtube stuff...it's like, I don't know what else to do...i enjoy just listening to satsangs, but it seems like enough is enough and i feel like maybe i'm still depressed, as there's no motivation to do things...i can have thoughts of, for example, getting a master's degree in counseling, but then, it's like, why follow the imaginations of the mind anymore...i function in my job quite well and don't discuss my spiritual process with anyone there...i am now single and live quietly in a cabin in rural connecticut...i will go see family and friends in ohio, but i can only do quick visits for a day or two...after that, i need to be on my way...i still talk with my old girlfriend, who i could share this process with...i can't imagine being with someone who i couldn't discuss it with...or maybe it would be better....anyway, i'm living a hermit's life and to a degree it suits me, but as i said, things just feel incomplete... i know this is just my mind rambling, and these questions don't arise when i do the "I AM", but nonetheless, this is what is arising...hope this helps....thanks and take care....P

P, You are 99% done. You are doing fine. The sense of incompleteness itself is the last barrier. It is not you. It is not real. Just keep going. Love, Ed Imagine 99% cooked. That is VERY, VERY good.