The subtle difference between Consciousness and Awareness

In trying to communicate the insight of Non-duality, you often hit the problem that how you understand a word is very different to how it is generally understood. Like the word 'consciousness'.

If you can get someone to break through to the true meaning of the word consciousness, then you've got them as close to the truth as possible.

But generally consciousness is associated with a body, with a brain, or a mind.

And even if you break to those barriers, it's still associated with experience; the presence of experience. And even that is not true once you get to the true understanding of consciousness.

So, because it ends up meaning something so different, it might be better to just use a different word. And so you will hear words like Awareness, or as I like to use it, Sentience.

But if the meaning of these words is unclear then nothing has been resolved. It is creating more problems.

So let's try to cut through to the meaning of these words using an analogy. An analogy which is quite close to the truth.

So say that you're listening, and just focus on that sense. You're just listening. Somewhere in the dark, in a wide open place.

And as you listen, you start to forget all the other senses.

The thinking stops, and the seeing, and the feeling, and all that.

So there is just listening.

But there's no sound.

And after a while you forget that you're even listening.

And you forget that you even exist. That you're still there.

This is Sentience.

Awareness.

The true meaning behind the word Consciousness.

Because there's still this capacity to experience. Sentience — the capacity to sense and know and feel.

And so in this perfect silence, this sentient Stillness, this silent Awareness, there can suddenly be an experience.

A sound is heard.

And it is heard because you were still listening.

Because Awareness was still present.

And as there is the sound, simultaneous to it, the sense "I Am" arises.

The knowledge of your own existence. I am here.

But just preceding that, prior to that experience, there was no way to differentiate between you and Sentience.

So, this thought experiment is demonstrating that you really are Sentience, Awareness, or pure Consciousness.

Even emptied of all content, it doesn't change your nature.

You are still That.

Only when thinking can we debate whether you're a body or brain, or a person or a mind.

But as actual fact, what I'm saying is quite clear.

That you are Sentience. Aware-ness. Pure Conscious-ness.

And to say that this depends on anything, is missing the point of what we're talking about.

We're not talking about experience, which can be argued does depend on the body, the sense organs, events taking place in space and time.

But when we just talk about Sentience, then all those factors are irrelevant.

Because we're talking about the pure capacity to sense and know and feel . This state of consciousness being experienced right now, of course has a human taste.

It is a human consciousness. Which you can tell from the kind of senses arising, capacity to think, and so on. It has a different taste to a bird consciousness, or an alien consciousness.

But in this we are just referring to the kinds of experiences arising.

And if we talk from that standpoint, taking experience as primary, then of course there are ways to distinguish between individuals, between minds, based on memory and history and so on.

But all this is the content. The content of Consciousness.

And is not what is truly conscious.

It's all insentient phenomena.

And if we switch attention from the phenomena to the Awareness itself, to Sentience, there's no way to distinguish between my awareness and your awareness.

Because the me and the you come later.

Those differences are only based on the particular stream of experience being referred to.

But all streams of experience arise in the very same Awareness.

What attribute would you use to differentiate awareness from awareness? Sentience from sentience?

There is no human sentience or animal sentience or artificial sentience.

Sentience is just Sentience.

It is not an individual property; not possessed by things.

It does not depend on circumstances and processes in the way that experienced does.

Awareness, or Sentience, is indistinguishable from the fact of being.

Not being in any particular state, but be-ing as a matter of fact.

Not being as a phenomena under observation, but being as being rooted in Reality. As being a factor of Reality. The highest aspect of Reality.

Without which all else might as well not exist.

And if you consider what are generally called 'unconscious' states; deep sleep, coma, the state just before being born, just before the very first experience, it cannot be said that there's no Awareness there.

Since this state of being 'unconscious' is precisely where experience emerges.

This empty Awareness, pure Sentience, is the birthplace of experience.

But on the other hand, if you empty the content of consciousness, then Consciousness is indistinguishable from nothingness. From an empty void.

It is even indistinguishable from what was there before the Big Bang.

When you were listening, and you forgot that you were listening, or that you even existed, in that pure Sentience were you any different to what is there before the Big Bang?

What dimension can you use to draw a distinction?

There are no dimensions left at that point.

This is why Awareness, or Sentience, or pure Consciousness, is declared primordial, the changeless, unborn, unconditioned, Supreme Reality.

Until experience appears, there's nothing to identify with or call 'me'.

There is no space and time.

This is what can be called non-local. Real.

Awareness is not owned by any individual.

Sentience is not possessed by any being.

When experience arises and with it brings the knowledge "I Am"; that you exist, what it is really proving is that you are Awareness.

That you are this sentient Stillness.

That in that perfect silence is your true identity.

You are the silent Awareness.

Let's end with a dialogue from Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, which was truly crucial in helping me get to this understanding.

A questioner asked Nisargadatta,

"You use the words 'aware' and 'conscious'. Are they not the same?"

And Nisargadatta replies,

"Awareness is primordial; it is the original state, beginningless, endless, uncaused, unsupported, without parts, without change.

Consciousness is on contact, a reflection against a surface, a state of duality.

There can be no consciousness without Awareness, but there can be Awareness without consciousness, as in deep sleep.

Awareness is absolute, consciousness is relative to its content; consciousness is always of something.

Consciousness is partial and changeful, Awareness is total, changeless, calm and silent. And it is the common matrix of every experience."

"How does one go beyond consciousness into awareness?"

"Since it is Awareness that makes consciousness possible, there is Awareness in every state of consciousness.

Therefore, the very consciousness of being conscious is already a movement in Awareness.

Interest in your stream of consciousness takes you to Awareness.

It is not a new state. It is at once recognized as the original, basic existence, which is life itself, and also love and joy."

"Since Reality is all the time with us, what does self-realization consist of?"

"Realization but the opposite of ignorance.

To take the world as real and one's Self as unreal is ignorance. The cause of sorrow.

To know the Self as the only Reality and all else as temporal and transient is freedom, peace and joy.

It is all very simple. Instead of seeing things as imagined, learn to see them as they are.

It is like cleansing a mirror. The same mirror that shows you the world as it is, will also show you your own face.

The thought 'I am' is the polishing cloth. Use it."