Insight Editions · No. 371
We Are Consciousness Itself
A Communication Freely Offered to All
Adi Da Samraj
A study edition of the Dawn Horse Press booklet that sets out Adi Da's one-sentence summary of Truth, with readings from Notice This and The Dawn Horse Testament on the witness, the three states and the unchanging nature of awareness.
A study guide to We Are Consciousness Itself by Adi Da Samraj. Shared free for personal reading; not for sale and not endorsed by the author or publishers. Please read and buy the original.
CORE CLAIM
"No matter what arises, or does not arise, you are only Consciousness Itself." Body, emotion and thought appear in awareness; awareness itself never changes.
SCOPE
A 21-page free booklet (Dawn Horse Press, 2013): an editor's introduction, eleven short readings mostly from Notice This, one from The Dawn Horse Testament, and a closing plea that the message reach every child.
KEY FIGURES
Adi Da Samraj (1939 to 2008); the anonymous editors of the Adidam community who frame his words.
BEST FOR
First-time readers of Adi Da, and anyone wanting a two-minute witness exercise (the memory comparison on p. 15).
The Book on One Page
The booklet makes one argument in three moves. Awareness is more basic than body, emotion or mind; we mistake ourselves for what we are aware of; and seeing through that mistake, "no matter what arises," is Realisation itself.
| Part | Pages | Payload |
|---|---|---|
| 1. What are we? | 3 to 5 | Science, psychology and religion each name a part; the fact of awareness is prior to all three |
| 2. The readings | 7 to 17 | Not the body, not the thinker, not any of the three states; everything passes on the screen of Consciousness |
| 3. A gift for all | 18 to 20 | The sentence should be taught from infancy, free; realising it "requires a great process" |
What Are We?
The editors open with a four-line hook: science says body, psychology says mind, religion says soul. Their answer is none of these.
What is "most basic to human existence" is "the fact of awareness": not what we are aware of, but "the simple fact that we are always aware." Adi Da calls this constant "Consciousness Itself," and "the True Water of life."
He stated the Truth in two forms, both said to hold "no matter what arises":
No matter what arises, or does not arise, you are only Consciousness Itself. No matter what arises, or does not arise, there is only Consciousness Itself.
Adi Da Samraj, p. 5The first sentence is about identity; the second is about reality. Together they move from "I am not the body" to "there is nothing but Consciousness."
The Readings
Ten short passages from Notice This build a step-by-step disidentification, then one from The Dawn Horse Testament names what remains.
- Not the body. "You presume you are the body, but, in reality, you are only witnessing the body." Consciousness comes first; forgetting it is how "Consciousness Itself becomes the unconscious."
- Not the thinker. The belief that you are "the source and cause and doer of thinking" is "not inspected" and "not true." You are "the formless and actionless mere witness."
- Not the three states. Waking, dreaming and sleeping all pass, "therefore, you cannot be any of those conditions." Consciousness remains.
- The screen. Everything is seen through the "glasses" of Consciousness and "appears on Consciousness as on a screen."
- Awareness never changes. There are no "different colors" of awareness. The error is saying "I am suffering" when the body suffers.
- Recall a vivid memory from earlier life until you "feel the event again."
- Compare not its content but "the feeling of yourself" then with the feeling of yourself now.
- Notice that the conscious being "feels the same whether it is five years old or ... seventy."
The Dawn Horse Testament passage closes the sequence: Consciousness is "not an effect" of any condition and remains "the same Free Love-Bliss of Being."
The memory test shows that a sense of continuity persists; it does not show that awareness is unconditioned or Divine. Neuroscience and Buddhist analysis both treat that felt sameness as constructed. The booklet moves from the first claim to the second without argument.
A Gift for All
The closing pages turn from teaching to mission: the sentence is "a basic common gift to humankind" that "no one should be deprived" of.
Adi Da asks that it be taught "from their infancy," offered "without cost or obligation," and become "the foundation of human culture in the future." He separates hearing from realising: "To Realize the Truth of that verbal communication requires a great process." The back matter describes him as "the Eternal Presence of Love and Joy," a devotional claim the reader can set apart from the teaching.
Master Takeaways
A short booklet with one portable sentence and one exercise.
- Awareness is prior to body, emotion and mind.
- Identity and reality get one sentence each: you are, and there is, only Consciousness.
- You witness the body; you are not located in it.
- Thinking happens; the "doer" of it is an uninspected assumption.
- What passes cannot be you: waking, dreaming and sleeping all pass.
- Awareness has no varieties; only its contents change.
- The memory comparison is a quick test of the unchanging witness.
- Hearing is not realising; the sentence is free, the process is not quick.
| Model | Use it when |
|---|---|
| Two-sentence Truth | Holding personal and cosmic claims together |
| Screen and glasses | Watching thoughts without owning them |
| Memory comparison | Checking the sameness of awareness across a lifetime |