Trying to get a sense of what I and Exist mean in the first place.
“One day I attempted to imagine the planet without me, when I am gone. Life goes on, and I am not around to enjoy it anymore! The air, the body, the sun on my skin, the laughter, the company. Then I thought wait, should I also be sad because of my absence on the planet before I was born?”
And then I thought...
Many parts of who I am have been around for millions of years, they make up my body, minerals, plants, and animals. My genetic journey is old as well... and my sense of Self is made up of all that (my biochemical and physical body), as well as my culture, made up of what my cultural editors (parents, teachers, etc) taught me, and my experiences and understanding combined, my own culture... my emotions as well. Oh.. turns out I carry emotions in my epigenome as well... handed down to me for who knows how many generations of my ancestors.... do those belong to "me"?
Do I exist?
Try and slice a piece of finger see if you do...
Do I exist as a single "thing", outside my awareness? I exist as a dynamic living process and the fortunate convergence of matter into this amazing body. Not only am I self aware and I got senses... I can create myself however I want, wow!
I am not a mind, that's just another awesome tool living inside my body.
To think of the essential aspects of understanding, of taste, smell, goosebumps, hearing, touch, warmth, cold, seeing... making choices, imagining what's next.. what a trip.
The earth will digest my body when I die, but where will "I" go? That's what I don't know. We know we are in space, but no one knows what's going really.
"I"? What is "I"?
Is "I" just another expression of the infinite consciousness variations running through life?
Does a protein wonder the same? Do particles wonder the same?
Learn how to look at things for what they are. Because "things" are mind-blowing. And let's try to come up with another word for "things" while we're at it too.
I exist both inside and outside myself, I am made of organic matter, minerals, memories, my senses, and experience. I am made of memory, imagination, senses, understanding, and choices. I am made of everyone and everything that was alive before me on Earth.
Food for thought.