The complete 'I am' quotes of Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj Pradeep Apte

place through these gunas and this consciousness keeps on
humming.
144
‘Satva’ is only the essence of the five elements and in that is the
knowledge ‘I am’. All that is still of the five elements, so how did
this come about? Then my Guru told me, ‘this is what you are’, the
whole story; so from my own experience I know that it is all
ignorance.
145
My Guru pointed out to me that originally I had nothing to do with
all this and all I have with which to solve this mystery of life is the
knowledge ‘I am’; without that there is nothing. So I got hold of it,
as my Guru told me, and then I wanted to find out how this body
aspect came about without my knowledge and how alone on that
any other knowledge come about, and that again is a result of five
elements. Therefore, whatever anybody thinks he has, is sheer
ignorance, and I know it from my own experience.
146
If this is ignorance, then where is my beingness? My beingness is
in a town which is no-town, in a place which is no-place. How did
this come about? Because of the knowledge ‘I am’, which is
ignorance. Maya, which came about suddenly, without my asking.
Once having come about, this Maya liked what it had created and
it wanted that beingness to last for all time. Maya embraced it with
such fierceness, that, at any cost, it wants to prolong the existence
of that beingness as long as it can.