The Individual Will

Nisargadatta Maharaj

Q: If one is trying to stay awake, saying a "mantra", or meditating, and keeps pulling himself back from sleep, is he not doing something?

M: At the stage of a seeker what he is doing may be right, but he will soon find out that the seeker disappears in the seeking. When the seeker disappears there is no question of doing. Later the seeker will understand that it was not his true nature which was doing all this, but that to which the label "born" was attached - that is the consciousness which has identified itself with the body and the states of waking and sleeping. That whole bundle is what was doing and he is not that. This body is perceptible, but my true nature is That which was before the body and the consciousness came into being. Anything that is sensorially seen and interpreted by the mind is an appearance in consciousness, and is not true. I am not telling you anything which is foreign to my experience, I am telling you what I have understood and experienced. It is very simple: this is time-bound and anything which is time-bound is untrue, because time itself is a concept. 

What I am telling you is based on this simple fact, as it is based on my experience. If it appeals to you as a concept at the moment, accept it. Otherwise not. 

If at all you want to do something, do that which you cannot do at all. That is the state of no-being.