The underlying form of consciousness is witnessing, as if to say: '...this is, this is, this is...'. Also as a continual fresh upwelling, so more like: "...and this is and this is and this is...' (Unpunctuated, but then the punctuation can go anywhere. ) Temporalisation is the 'and', clearing, not just in the sense of a clearing in a forest, but also clearing or refreshing the screen. This isn't exactly effortless, what rises up is initially too big to handle and the work of consciousness in the particular sense is to render it down, draw it into smallness. That's where the utility of the self structure comes in, it is a reduction filter, and personal identity probably has no more purpose than to catalyse that process, otherwise it appears to add no value. It is simply irrelevant whether some sort of numerical identity holds experience together except for the purpose of speedy categorisation and disarmament.