The "I" of the mind consciousness is a false self

The arising of the solitary mental consciousness requires the eighth consciousness and the manas, requires the mind consciousness's own seeds of consciousness, and also requires the participation of mental sense-objects. When the solitary mental consciousness manifests, the conditions it requires are fewer than those required by the mental consciousness accompanying the five sense consciousnesses, and also fewer than those required for the five sense consciousnesses to arise. Therefore, the solitary mental consciousness in the distracted state arises most easily. This shows that our minds are distracted much of the time; consequently, cultivating meditative concentration is not easy, and it is also difficult to concentrate when doing things—we always like to think of this and that, letting our thoughts run wild. Sometimes we do not even know what we are thinking about. All these instances of solitary mental consciousness are produced by the manas grasping at the myriad dharmas; the root lies right here in the manas. Therefore, only by subduing the manas so that it does not grasp at things everywhere can our thoughts become unified and the mind consciousness attain meditative concentration.

Since the arising of the solitary mind consciousness also requires certain conditions, this mind consciousness is produced by causes and conditions, and is therefore not self-existent. A dharma produced by causes and conditions is subject to arising and ceasing, impermanent; it is fundamentally not the self. A dharma that changes constantly is not enduring; it is suffering, and what is suffering is also not the self. The true self is not suffering; it is permanent, neither arising and ceasing nor intermittent. He is not constrained by any conditions; He has always existed, without any phenomenon of arising and ceasing—that is the true self. Apart from this, everything is false, an illusory, provisional self. Whatever must be constrained by various conditions is not real, and therefore is not the self. By frequently contemplating this principle, one can gradually transform one's own thinking.