The Venerable Khemaka [while] sick, afflicted and gravely ill [answers inquiry of] the elder monks dwelling at Kosambī in Ghosita’s Park:
“These five aggregates subject to clinging have been spoken of by the Blessed One; that is, form, feeling, perception, volitional formations, and consciousness. Does the Venerable Khemaka regard anything as self or as belonging to self among these five aggregates subject to clinging?”
“These five aggregates subject to clinging have been spoken of by the Blessed One; that is, form, feeling, perception, volitional formations, and consciousness. I do not regard anything among these five aggregates subject to clinging as self or as belonging to self… Friends, [the notion] ‘I am’ has not yet vanished in me in relation to these five aggregates subject to clinging, but I do not regard [anything among them] as ‘This I am.… Even though a noble disciple has abandoned the five lower fetters, still, in relation to the five aggregates subject to clinging, there lingers in him a residual conceit ‘I am,’ a desire ‘I am,’ an underlying tendency ‘I am’ that has not yet been uprooted…. As he dwells thus contemplating rise and fall in the five aggregates subject to clinging, the residual conceit ‘I am,’ the desire ‘I am,’ the underlying tendency ‘I am’ that had not yet been uprooted—this comes to be uprooted.”
(Saṃyutta Nikāya 22:89)
From: The Dalai Lama; Bodhi, Bhikkhu. In the Buddha’s Words: An Anthology of Discourses from the Pali Canon (Teachings of the Buddha)