𝐅𝐫𝐨𝐦: "𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐠𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐌𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐭𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐨𝐧 𝐄𝐦𝐩𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬"

IT IS NOT THERE - AND NEVER WAS

"If you are not convinced that you behave emotionally as if you had a lasting, single and independent self, then it is important to address yourself to this issue before moving on to consider the doctrine of not-self.

Think carefully about pain and suffering and ask yourself who or what it is that is suffering. Who is afraid of what will happen ; who feels bad about what has happened ; why does death seem such a threat when the present disappears every moment, scarcely having had a chance to arise?

You will find that your thinking is full of contradictions, inconsistencies and irresolv­able paradoxes. This is normal. Everyone (except, perhaps, the insane) have a common sense notion of what or who they are which works (more or less) and enables them to function as normal human beings.

However, when the meditator addresses himself to what or who this self is, he cannot find it.

Then gradually, very gradually, it dawns on him that the reason he cannot find it is that it is not there and never was."

~ Khenpo Tsultrim Gyamtso Rinpoche

From: "Progressive Stages of Meditation on Emptiness"