I am what I am. An old spiritual teaching that seems to point out that our nature, whatever form it may appear to be, simply is. Yet, like many other teachings, this phrase often comes into misapprehension. We can understand the appeal: on a more literal, immediate level, it seems to tell us that there is nothing left to conquer, nothing left to change: that perfection lies precisely with what can be observed, nothing else to be found. Reality is known, look no further.
More often than not it is this literal interpretation that many of us use to make their stand. I am what I am becomes a justification for behaviour, rather than a perspective on existence. I am like this, leaving implicitly that you'll have to weather this I am. I am what I am is taken as meaning that there’s no point in changing myself, that there's nothing that really needs to be changed – so I'll remain neatly in my comfort zone and care not about the world and the needs of others.
To a certain extent this perspective is correct – conceptually, at least. Yet, quite often our experience tells us otherwise. How often does this I am what I am feels empty and lonely? How often do we feel trapped instead of liberated, doubtful and uncertain instead of happy and carefree? Experience, life itself, shows us that, even though our perspective might be correct, we cannot sustain it.
And perhaps this is the key. Perhaps the point of these words has always been that we should sustain this perspective, no matter what. Our lives may be going swimmingly or everything may be collapsing all around us – and still we will feel the same in regards to what we are. We'll still feel intimately connected to our sense of self, as complete as we can muster it.
This is because this simple sentence embodies more than a mundane perspective on existence: it embraces and redirects us towards a transcendental one. One where we experience complete communion with our nature and, in doing so, are plunged into the comprehensive awareness that nothing remains to be changed, because the ultimate experience of being has been attained: the very place where the sense of completeness that stems from that phrase truly emanates from.
I am what I am focuses not merely on the visible aspects of the ego, the personality, the set of ideas and beliefs with which we identify ourselves, but rather points in the direction where they retain no meaning, where they become impossible to engage with, where they are rendered useless and we are, therefore, even if only momentarily, liberated.
In this respect, I am what I am, becomes in fact a call to arms, spiritual arms: the embracing of a new viewpoint about ourselves, one where the habitual trappings are no longer valid, where we can re-establish our connection with ourselves on the most profound of experiences and, as such, reconnect also with others, with nature, with the world, with everything.
I am what I am is one of the simplest ways we have to describe and, more importantly, attain, the divine spark, if you will. It certainly encapsulates the closest path we can take to get to our very own, intimate nature. It is the echo for the long lost reunion with ourselves. That is what awaits us on the other side of the mirror, on the other side of the self.
May you be able to find yourself, unblemished and beautiful in all the purity that has always contained you. May you find that which the self so expertly hides and, who knows? maybe even protects. May you find the timeless place of no-self within and bring it more fully into fruition and into the world.
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