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

yourself carefully, rejecting all that does not necessarily go with
basic fact ‘I am’. The ideas: I am born at a given place, at a given
time, from my parents and now I am so-and-so, living at, married
to, father of, employed by, and so on, are not inherent in the sense
‘I am’. Our usual attitude is ‘I am this’ or ‘that’. Separate
consistently and perseveringly the ‘I am’ from ‘this’ or ‘that’ and
try to feel what it means to be, just to ‘be’, without being ‘this’ or
‘that’. All our habits go against it and the task of fighting them is
long and hard sometimes, but clear understanding helps a lot. The
clearer you understand that on the level of the mind you can be
described in negative terms only, the quicker you will come to the
end of your search and realize your limitless being.
11
When you see the world you see God. There is no seeing God apart
from the world. Beyond the world to see God is to be God. The
light by which you see the world, which is God is the tiny little
spark: ‘I am’, apparently so small and yet the first and the last in
every act of knowing and loving.
12
All is secondary to the tiny little thing which is the ‘I am’. Without
the ‘I am’ there is nothing. All knowledge is about the ‘I am’.
False ideas about this ‘I am’ lead to bondage, right knowledge
leads to freedom and happiness. The ‘I am’ denotes the inner while
‘there is’ denotes the outer; both are based on the sense of being.
13
The sense of ‘I am’ is your own. You cannot part with it, but you
can impart it to anything, as in saying, I am young; I am rich, and
so on. But such self-identifications are patently false and the cause
of bondage.