From the perspective of Dzogchen, what is ordinarily called “self” is regarded as a conceptual construction, a transient pattern woven from thoughts, emotions, memories, and bodily sensations. This familiar ego-identity appears solid and continuous, yet when examined closely it cannot be found as an independently existing entity. It is empty of inherent existence, dependently arisen, and therefore fundamentally illusory. Clinging to this fabricated self gives rise to grasping and aversion, and thus to suffering. The sense of “I” and “mine” is therefore understood as a mistaken apprehension, a misreading of what awareness actually is.

In contrast to this illusory ego, Dzogchen points to rigpa, often described as primordial or natural awareness. This awareness is present prior to any conceptual division into “self” and “other,” and is characterized as empty of fixed essence yet luminous, cognizant, and spontaneously present. It is not a personal soul or substantial “true self,” but rather the basic nature of mind itself, unborn and unchanging, without individual owner or boundary. When rigpa is recognized, the dualistic structure of an internal observer standing apart from an external world loosens and can dissolve. There is then simply pure knowing, without a separate knower set over against what is known.

Dzogchen thus neither affirms an eternal, substantial self nor falls into a nihilistic denial of awareness. The conventional person, with all its traits and history, is understood as a dynamic display or expression of this ground of awareness, like waves on the surface of an ocean that do not define the ocean’s depth. Thoughts of identity continue to arise, but they are seen as movements within rigpa rather than as evidence of an independent entity. Practice in this tradition emphasizes a direct recognition of this natural state and a sustained resting in it, allowing the previously reified sense of self to relax. As this recognition stabilizes, the illusion of a separate, solid self naturally subsides, revealing the openness and clarity that were never truly absent.