ॐ
Nāṉ Yār? (Who am I?)
What rises in this body as ‘I’, that alone is the mind.
If [one] investigates in what place the thought called ‘I’ rises at first in the body, one will come to know that it rises in the heart [the innermost core of oneself, which is what one essentially is]. That alone is the birthplace of the mind.
Even if one remains thinking ‘I, I’, it will take and leave one in that place.
Of all the thoughts that appear [or arise] in the mind, the thought called ‘I’ alone is the first [primal, basic, original or causal] thought. Only after this rises do other thoughts rise. Only after the first person appears do the second and third persons appear; without the first person the second and third persons do not exist.
Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi - WHO AM I?, Paragraph Five
Original Tamil prose by Bhagavan Sri Ramana with English translation by Michael James
