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

permanent state. The borderline of beingness and non-beingness is
intellect-boggling, because the intellect subsides at that precise
location. This borderline is the ‘maha-yoga’. You must be at that
borderline, that ‘maha-yoga’ state’. You descend into the ‘godown’
of that state which has the title ‘birth’.
315
The sense that ‘you are’ is a big thing. What is most significant is
the fact that you remember your sense of being, subsequently all
other things appear. Earlier this memory ‘I am’ was not and
suddenly it appeared. Now I expound on the spiritual talk called
‘niroopana’. In Marathi the word ‘niroopana’ is derived from the
word ‘niroopa’ (nirope), which means ‘message’. Therefore, to
deliver any spiritual talk that is ‘niroopana’, the primary message
‘I am’ must first be present, then whatever ensues from this
primary message will be the spiritual talk.
316
This little container of food essence is being sucked by that
beingness, ‘I am’ day and night. The principle that sucks that
container is not the body; it is apart from the body. This beingness
principle dwells in that food body itself. Just as the child sucks on
the mother’s breast, the beingness consumes the body.
317
Just as the salty taste is present in the entire ocean, the beingness or
the sense of ‘I am’ in the human form has the inherent capacity to
be all-pervading, but having being conditioned – and thereby
limited – itself to the body form, it is interested only in protecting
and preserving the body.