Exploring the Ground of Awareness: A Conversation About Consciousness, Presence, and Awe

What is consciousness? What remains when we strip away thoughts, senses, and all the activity of the mind? These questions touch the very heart of human experience, yet they defy easy answers. In this exploration, we discover that what we usually call “consciousness” or “awareness” is not something we can fully know or define—it’s the ground in which all experience arises.

The Paradox of Consciousness

If we remove all perception and thinking, what remains? That remaining presence, "pure awareness", is often described as unknowable. Any attempt to grasp it conceptually immediately transforms it into something else: an object of thought. Yet we can experience it directly, even if we cannot “know” it in the usual sense.

Science cannot measure this ground of awareness because it is not an object—it is pre-conceptual and non-dual, meaning beyond subject-object distinctions. Neuroscience can study correlates of consciousness—measurable brain processes that consistently accompany specific conscious experiences, such as which neurons light up on an fMRI when one sees the color green—but it cannot access awareness itself.

The same applies to logic or empirical proof: any attempt to define or prove awareness using conceptual frameworks changes the very thing being pointed to. This is a subtle but crucial point. It means that awareness, is pre-conceptual—it’s not an object, thought, or thing you can measure or define. The moment you try to describe it, define it, or prove it with concepts, you’re turning it into an object of thought. And once it becomes an object, it’s no longer the direct, immediate awareness itself, it’s a concept about awareness.

This brings to mind the sage advice: “You can't know it, you have to be it.” The irony is that it is what every single person already is, behind their infinitely varied individual experiences.

So, does the fact that awareness can't be measured by science nor defined or proven by logic make it irrelevant? No! The value lies in direct experience. By turning attention inward, noticing the awareness in which all thoughts, feelings, and sensations arise, one can naturally access qualities like peace, joy, love, and silent awe—not as something manufactured, but as intrinsic expressions of our being. It's amazing! It's strange! Why those feelings? Here's what I think.

Why Inquiry Feels Good

Why do these states arise when we inquire into our own awareness?

• Detachment from identification: By observing thoughts and sensations without identifying with them, we loosen the ego’s grip. The ego is always worrying, trying to control a universe it can’t control, and it whispers, “I’m not okay unless everything happens exactly the way I want.” Since that will never happen, letting go of this struggle naturally brings a sense of peace.

• Orientation toward presence: Attention shifts to what is already present, rather than chasing imagined future concerns or reflecting on the past, producing clarity and joy.

• Expansion of awareness: Broadening the sense of self beyond the personal “I” fosters love and connection. Everyone is the same awareness that inherently is. Ram Dass said, “Everyone is God in drag.”

• Neurophysiological effects: Quieting the mind’s habitual activity reduces stress and creates a natural sense of contentment. If you do crunches all day, your abs will spasm—same concept in the brain.

  
  

Interestingly, these states of peace, contentment, love, and joy are actually the very things the “I,” aka ego, seeks externally. In resting in awareness, the mind experiences its own nature as inherently pleasurable, loving, and free. It’s so crazy! We are the dog chasing its own tail.

Words, Analogies, and Metaphors

Language is tricky. “Consciousness” and “awareness” carry heavy conceptual baggage, often implying subject-object experience. Many traditions use metaphors or alternative terms to point toward this experience. Here are some I find helpful:

• Sky and clouds: Thoughts are clouds; awareness is the sky.

• Screen and movie: Experiences play on the screen; awareness is the screen itself.

• Ocean and waves: Awareness is the ocean; thoughts and sensations are waves.

• Mirror and reflections: Awareness is the mirror; experiences are reflections.

• Presence, the Ground, Being, the Field: Neutral, evocative terms that avoid objectifying the experience.

Historically, what mystics called God is often pointing to this same ground—the formless, unchanging presence in which all phenomena arise.

Direct Experience: A Simple Practice

To move beyond conceptual understanding, direct experience is key. Here’s a simple secular practice:

1. Settle: Sit comfortably, soften your gaze or close your eyes, and notice your body and breath.

2. Observe: Let thoughts, emotions, and sensations arise and pass without engaging or judging them.

3. Turn attention inward: Ask, “Who is noticing this?” or “What is aware of these experiences?”

4. Rest in awareness: Simply notice the field of awareness itself.

5. Notice naturally arising qualities: Peace, joy, love, and clarity often appear effortlessly.

6. Return gradually: Carry this sense of openness into daily life.

Even a minute or two of this practice can create a subtle shift in how we experience life, and over time, the felt sense of awareness becomes familiar.

The Final Resting Place

After inquiry, reflection, and noticing, what often remains is a soft, silent awe—a sense of being that is effortless, open, and joyful. Some might even call this enlightenment, or as I like to poetically describe it: “a soft smile and chuckle.”It’s playful, gentle, and profound—a recognition of the mystery of existence itself.

In the end, the point is not to grasp or define, but to experience and rest in this ground of awareness. Words, metaphors, and practices are only pointers. What matters is the direct, living recognition of the presence in which all experience unfolds.