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

product of the knowledge ‘I am’. A ‘jnani’ is that state from which
the witnessing of the knowledge ‘I am’ takes place. In that ‘jnani’
state there is no touch of ‘I amness’ (it is a quality-less state) and it
is not knowledge – knowledge means ‘I amness’.
208
‘I am’ is only a few letters. Has anyone been able to keep this ‘I
am’ in his pocket for all time? If whoever feels that ‘I am’ had
knowledge, would he have cared to become this ‘I am’? No, he
would have said ‘I don’t want this consciousness’. You are unreal
– you know that you are – that is also unreal. This sense of
presence is an untruth, it is like a dream.
209
The ‘Linga-deha’ is the seed, the chemical, the product of the five
elemental essences which give rise to and sustain the
consciousness ‘I am’. Just like the seed of a tree, that seed latently
contains all future manifestations and expressions of the tree that
will sprout out of the seed. You take a fountain pen and on the
paper you put a drop of ink, so that drop is the ‘Linga-deha’. That
drop is the moment of conception; its expression is the thoughtfree
state, like space, in the knowingness state. That ‘Linga-deha’,
that little drop, and the knowledge ‘I am’ is the same.
210
It is not important where you are, once you are established in the ‘I
am’. It is like space – it neither comes nor goes; just as when you
demolish the walls of a building only space remains.