The yogi and mystic Sri Ramana Maharshi taught a very clear form of self inquiry, and the text here could be considered the foundation of the spiritual search.

Who am I? I know that I am, but do I know what I am? Am I what I now seem to be, or am I something distinct from this appearance? Now I seem to be a person, a physical body endowed with life, mind, intellect and will, but is this what I actually am? Am I just this set of phenomena, or am I something more fundamental? If I am not what I now seem to be, how can I find out what I actually am? How can I be aware of myself as I actually am?

Am I just a temporary appearance, as I now seem to be, or am I eternal? Am I finite, as I now seem to be, or am I infinite? Am I something that appears and disappears in time and space, or something in which time and space appear and disappear? Am I something that is permanent, or am I just something that appears and disappears? Or is there some sense in which I am permanent, and another sense in which I am something that appears and disappears? If so, which is real, the permanent ‘I’ or the ‘I’ that appears and disappears?

If I am something that appears and disappears, from what do I appear and into what do I disappear? From where or from what have I risen? Do I actually appear and disappear, or do I merely mistake myself to be something else that appears and disappears? The body, life, mind, intellect and will that I now seem to be do appear and disappear, but do I appear and disappear along with them, or do I exist independent of their appearance and disappearance? Whatever appears and disappears does so in my awareness, so is not my awareness something more fundamental than anything that appears and disappears in it? What is this awareness in which everything else appears and disappears? Is this awareness what I actually am? If so, how can I ascertain this? How can I distinguish myself from everything that appears and disappears in me? How can I know myself as I actually am?