In physics, the term 'spaciotemporal' denotes phenomena with both space and time components. The question-based approach outlined in Not the Body, Not the Mind emphasizes the 'space' part of the 'Who Am I?' mystery. The approach that we will follow in the rest of this article emphasizes the 'time' part of the same mystery :)
Let us begin with a story.
King Janak was a famous king. Once he lost battle to a neighboring king and was presented in shackles to the victorious king. The victorious king said, 'O King Janak, your kingdom is mine now. Since you were a good king, I will spare your life. However, you will have to leave my kingdom because there can be only one king in a kingdom.'
So King Janak walked and walked and walked. Nobody helped him because he was no longer the king. Upon crossing into a neighboring kingdom, he noticed beggars standing in a line for food. He joined the line. When his turn came, there was almost no food left. He noticed some scraps. He requested that the scraps be given to him. As soon as they were transferred into his bowl, an eagle swooped upon the bowl and its contents fell to the ground. Overcome by grief and despair, King Janak started shouting and cursing.
Within moments, King Janak noticed himself on his bed with sentries rushing towards him. They asked, 'Maharaj Ji, Maharaj Ji, What happened? You were shouting!' King Janak was stupefied. A moment ago, he was standing among beggars and a bowl with some food had fallen from his hands (he was in dream state). In the present moment, he was on a royal bed with sentries around him (he was in the waking state). So he started asking, 'Was that true or is this true?' Soon after, King Janak's queen rushed to him and asked, 'I heard that you were shouting. What happened?' King Janak parroted the same question, 'Was that true or is this true?'
As per the story, Sage Ashtavakra intuited King Janak's experience from afar. He presented himself to the king. King Janak asked him the same question, 'Was that true? Or is this true?'
The sage asked, 'King Janak, when the bowl with scraps of food fell from your hands, were you there?'
King Janak replied, 'Yeah, I was there. The bowl fell from my own hands. I saw it.'
The sage then asked, 'King Janak, right now, you're on your bed and you're having a conversation with me. Are you here?'
King Janak replied, 'Of course I am here and I see you right in front of me.'
Sage Ashtavakra replied, 'Neither that was truth, neither this is truth. Only you are truth.' (In Hindi, 'Na wo sach, na ye sach, tumhi sach.')
In the story of King Janak, 'truth' is being equated with 'lack of change' or 'permanence'. The message of the story is: 'I' (the Experiencer) is unchanging ('nitya' or 'satya' or 'sat'). However, the Universe (the Experience) keeps changing ('anitya' or 'asatya' or 'asat').
Advaita Vedanta lectures explain that we go through three states everyday: waking state, dream state and deep sleep. In waking state, we experience the world (plants, animals, people, earth, our body, our mind and so on); both the body and the mind are active. In dream state, the world vanishes but the mind is busy conjuring images of beings and objects in the form of dreams. In deep sleep, even the mind is inactive, so there is nothing to 'see' / experience. Throughout these states, The Experiencer is unchanging but The Experience keeps changing.
Turiya or Caturiya or Chaturtha (the fourth state) refers to The Experiencer. Somebody in the fourth state identifies himself with The Experiencer ('pure consciousness' / witness) and is able to witness the other three states.
Over the last several hundred years, the word Om has acquired many meanings. Here are some beautiful interpretations:
Interpretation I: Om consists of three phonemes: 'a', 'u' and 'm' which denote 'the beginning', 'the middle' and 'the end'. Thus Om represents the trinity of Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh. The idea behind Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh is to understand that everything in The Experience has a beginning (a phenomenon starts arising), a middle (where the phenomenon is sustained) and an end (the phenomenon passes away). Everything in The Experience is arising and passing.
Interpretation II: The symbol for Om has three lines which denotes the symbol for numeral 3, along with a dot. The three lines represent the waking state, the dream state and deep sleep. The three lines represent The Experience or Sakti. The 'dot' represents the fourth state; in other words 'pure awareness' or The Experiencer or Siva.
A variety of metaphors have been developed to conceptualize of 'The Void' or Siva. For example, the book 'Vijnana Bhairav Tantra' lists 112 techniques for conceptualizing / recognizing the concept of 'void' / 'shunya' / 'nothingness' / Siva. This book starts off beautifully: Siva's consort Parvati asks Siva, 'How may I find you?' :) Siva then presents 112 techniques. The beautiful part is that this conversation is initiated by Parvati and Siva responds with answers. Here is a summary of Vijnana Bhairav Tantra by Stas Bekman.
Here are some examples of void. The space between successive chants of Om is void. The empty space in a vessel is void. Mathematically, void is the complement of the universal set. The symbol 0 represents nothingness.
Note that the purpose of various examples is not to recognize nothingness / void in that specific example. The goal of these examples or metaphors is to prod us to understand that 'I am void'. In other words, their goal is to help us understand voidness with respect to seeing / witnessing / experiencing all phenomena occurring around us (the objects and being occurring in the five senses, the body and the mind) in third person. For this, we have to step back when we cognize any phenomena and ask ourselves, 'Who cognizes this phenomena?' For example, Ramana Maharshi fondly advocates, 'After you calm the mind with whatever meditation technique you follow, when the first thought arises, inquire: To whom does this thought arise?'
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