Most people can understand the illusion of self intellectually, but it’s another thing to grasp it on an experiential level—to know what it’s like to move through the world without the illusion. It is, in fact, possible to be aware of all of the usual things (sights, sounds, even thoughts) without feeling like the subject of all of those things or like a “self” who experiences those things. But this is something that’s quite difficult to communicate through language, which fails us when we’re trying to describe an experience to someone who hasn’t had it before.

In Chapter 5, Annaka walks the audience through her personal experience of attending a silent meditation retreat and dropping the illusion of self in meditation. She then speaks with two neuroscientists, Anil Seth and David Eagleman, about the experience of self at the level of the brain.