There is a need to know what is ‘I’ before indulging in the pursuit of truth.+

The Soul is the real Self. ‘The Soul is not 'I'.  Holding ‘Self as the 'I' is holding the illusory universe or Maya as a reality. There is a need to know what is ‘I’ before indulging in the pursuit of truth.

Dualist Guru including many thinkers could not distinguish between ‘I’ and the Self. They hold 'I' as the Self. Their highest was the Jiva. They are so much attached to the 'I' that they do not want to think that 'I' does not exist. Again they are unable to detach the ‘I’ from the Soul, which is the real Self.

The dualist Gurus object: - If everything else is false then the statement I am Brahman is itself false, but when one says non-duality is false, there must be the awareness, consciousness, behind the very statement. You will also go, die. One has to rely upon that which is permanent. The nondual  Soul, the Self, which is the witness of the ‘I’ alone is permanent. The Soul is present in the form of consciousness. 

Anything that one says is a witnessed (waking), but there is the formless witness (consciousness) there before any statement could be made.

They mean the body by “I", but it is the formless witness which is the real “‘Self’ ". Theists dualists did not, or could not analyze further than ‘I’ on this point because they thought the ‘I’ without the body as ‘Self’.

WHAT IS ‘I’?

The ‘I’ disappears as deep sleep, so what is the use of being attached to it? It is impermanent and illusory.

There is really no ‘I’. The ‘I’ is present in the form of the mind. And the mind is in the form of the universe. The universe appears as the waking or dream. The ‘I’ or mind or universe or waking or dream dies disappears as deep sleep.

One that appears as ‘I’ or the mind or universe or waking or dream is nothing but consciousness and it disappears as deep sleep is also consciousness. In deep sleep, it is in its formless nondual true nature. 

The one, which witnesses the coming and going, of the three states, is also the consciousness. Thus, the witness and the witnessed are one, in essence.

Thus, the universe is a reality on the base of the ego. You are the ego. The ego is the false self within the false experience (waking).

The universe is unreal on the base of the Soul, the Self.  The Soul is present in the form of consciousness. The seeker gradually will grasp and realize the unreal nature of the universe (‘I’).

Individuality is illusory because the ‘Self’ is not an individual because ‘Self’ is formless and it pervades in everything and everywhere in all the three states.

Dualist sages have written big volumes about the soul. Yet they are quite ignorant of the fact that the ‘I’ about which they write itself’ comes and goes and has no permanent existence, is only an idea after all.

What is it that appears as the ‘I’ and disappears as the ‘I-less? It is the Soul, which is present in the form of consciousness.

Do not make the mistake of holding the ‘I’ as the Self because it is not permanent. ‘I’ disappears and becomes ‘I’-less.

‘I’ is an illusion and the ‘I-LESS’ is real and eternal. The ‘I-LESS ‘appears as ‘I’ and ‘I ’‘disappears as I-LESS.

Bhagavad Gita: ~ The permanent is always there, only the transient ‘I’ comes and goes. (2.18)

The ‘I’ hides the truth of the whole.

The earliest ancient sages used the word ‘I’ to the witness of the three states not to the ego as moderns use it and think the ‘I’ without the body is the Self. The seeker has to understand the fact that ‘I’ is not the Self, but the witness of the ‘I’ is the true Self, which is eternal.

That is why Ashtavakra Gita 16:10:~ If you desire liberation, but you still say "I," If you feel the ‘Self’ is the ‘I’, You are not a wise man or a seeker. You are simply a man who suffers. : ~ Santthosh Kumaar