Why Is ‘I Am’ More Fundamental Than ‘I’?

"Why is ‘I am’ more fundamental than ‘I’? Rupert says: ‘The word “I” is not a statement about yourself. It’s just the name you give to yourself. The statement “I am” is a statement about yourself. It says something about your knowledge of yourself. So strictly speaking, there’s no difference between the two. But if you were to ask the absolute, tell us your name, it would say “I”. But if you were then to say tell us something about yourself, it would say “I am”. “I” is the subject, “am” is the verb. In order to have a verb, you must have a subject and an object. So when you say “I am”, you have a subject, a verb, but no object. The “I am” can have no object other than itself. As long as you only go as far as the “I am”, there’s no subject-object there. And that’s knowledge in identity, not knowledge in relationship. As soon as you add something to the “I am”, you have a subject and an object.’"

From event 05 - 12 October, 2025 Seven-Day Retreat at Garrison Institute, 5–12 October 2025

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