The ultimate truth of who you are is not I am this or I am that, but I am.
– Eckhart Tolle
There are two ways to approach this question.
WHAT CAN I KNOW FOR CERTAIN
One is to ask: What can I say something about for certain?
Thoughts say I am a human being, Norwegian, and so on. But I cannot know that for certain. It’s possible it’s some kind of dream or virtual reality. And it’s also possible it’s not what I most fundamentally am.
The same goes for anything within the content of my field of experience. I cannot know I am anything in particular within that.
If I say “I” am something in particular, even that’s too much. There is the appearance of an “I” here, but I cannot know that’s what I most fundamentally am.
What I can say is that there is capacity for all these experiences. They happen within and as what we can label consciousness. And that the reality of this is different from these concepts.
WHAT I AM, MOST FUNDAMENTALLY
The other is to ask: What am I, most fundamentally?
Am I this human self? Or any particular ideas about what I am? Or even the sense of “I”?
Or am I what this – and my field of experience – happens within and as?
ONLY AM
The only thing we can say for certain is that there are these experiences within and as what can be labeled consciousness.
There is only AM. Everything else is a story.