It was August 1979. I watched thirty films that month alone—twice as many as the month before. Around Ulsoor Lake stood four cinema halls, and most mornings I found myself in one of them, slipping into the first two rows for a little over a rupee.

What drew me wasn’t the film but the darkness. The moment the lights dimmed, I was entirely with myself. The world receded to a distant hum, leaving only the glowing rectangle ahead of me. On that screen unfolded strange stories, unfamiliar faces, drifting music, and impossible worlds. Sitting there, held by the dark, I watched these worlds rise and dissolve, one after another. That quiet immersion—alone yet surrounded—became its own kind of meditation.

Watching thirty films in a single month might seem unusual to many. Only much later did I realise that I had always been watching three films every single day and night. The waking state, the dream state, and the sleep state—each one its own cinema. In all three states, I am entirely with myself, witnessing strange worlds unfold: characters appearing and dissolving, stories rising and fading, scenes shifting without warning. I remain the silent watcher. Those thirty films in August 1979 were only a hint of the lifelong screening already happening within me.

If I take it literally, three films a day means I’ve watched ninety films this month, and about the same the month before. Extend that across a lifetime and the number grows into the tens of thousands. Stretch it across previous lifetimes and it swells beyond imagination.

Carry it further—into a Kalpa of 4.32 billion human years, into the day and night of Brahma, into the hundred-year lifespan of Brahma—and the arithmetic dissolves. Countless Brahmas have risen and faded, each with their own cycles of creation and dissolution, each with their own immeasurable screenings. Add them all together and the total becomes clear: uncountable, numberless, without beginning or end.

I have witnessed innumerable Brahmas come and go. I have remained the witness in every film. I have remained the witness without ever entering any of them. The films appear, play out their fixed span, and dissolve. I remain unchanged. Worlds rise and fall, characters come and go, stories unfold and fade—yet I have always been only the witness, untouched by any scene, unaltered by any storyline.

Am I the only one who is the witness? No. You too are the witness. You too are experiencing the same truth.

Are there countless separate witnesses scattered across beings? No. There is only one witness. Your task is to discover that one witness. Search for it with sincerity. When you find it, nothing I have described will seem unusual. You will recognise it instantly as your own deepest reality. There is nothing more thrilling, more meaningful, or more transformative than this search for the witness. And the way to begin is simple: Begin with inquiry “who am I ?”.