There is nowhere at all which is devoid of the Way.
— Huang Po
It has often been said that the root illusion is the subject/object divide—the thought-sense that we are separate from life, that we are an independent entity with free will and choice, that we are fundamentally incomplete or in some way deficient, that something bigger and better needs to happen, or that something that apparently is happening needs to stop happening, in order for us to finally be okay.
On the other side of this inside/outside illusion, in the so-called world that seems to be “out there,” apparently separate from us, all kinds of things appear to be wrong. From the illusory perspective of being a separate self in a solid and divided reality, we seem to be constantly confronted with apparent imperfection, horrific injustices, a sense of vulnerability, and the need to either do something or stop doing something.
But in our actual present moment experience, there is simply what is, as it is—and we can never actually get hold of how or what it is because it is ever-changing and unresolvable, and there is no place to stand outside of it. No inside/outside divide can actually be found. It appears to be there, but when we look for it, it can’t be found. There is no actual place where “inside” turns into “outside,” except conceptually.
Experientially, there is simply this one bottomless present moment—infinite, eternal, never the same way twice, always just this—ungraspable aliveness, seamless unicity, no-thing-ness appearing as this ever-changing magic show in which infinitely varied, ever-changing energies and sensations collapse and solidify into the seemingly coherent movie of waking life with all its identifiable characters, plotlines and seemingly solid objects and situations. And in the movie, with its billions of characters, it seems there must be billions of similar but never identical movies of waking life all playing simultaneously in some kind of holographic, fractal unfolding.
In our movie of waking life, as in a dream, all kinds of things appear to happen. Babies are born, people die, empires rise and fall. We seem to be a particular character navigating “our life.” We seem to make choices. There seems to be cause and effect, success and failure, good and evil.
We have various apparent problems and aspirations, so we undergo psychotherapy, take up yoga and meditation, attend satsangs, go into recovery programs, read books, and have all kinds of experiences—contracted experiences, expanded experiences, pleasant experiences and unpleasant ones. We try to control all of this, and sometimes our efforts seem to be working, but often they don’t seem to be working, and then we try harder—or, if we’ve heard that trying is the problem, we try not to try.
In the world that seems to be outside of us, all kinds of scary, unjust and upsetting things seem to be happening, so we organize political movements, march in the streets, run for office, fight wars, demonstrate for peace—whatever life moves each of us to do. Some of these efforts seem to bear fruit, while others seem to go nowhere. There are apparent advances and apparent setbacks. Society seems to improve in many ways, while at the same time, it seems to be going straight to hell in other ways. And no two of us seem to completely agree on which way is heaven and which is hell. We see an event one way, and we’re very sure that’s the truth, but then suddenly we get new information and see it in an entirely different way. We begin to suspect that all events are infinitely complex and unresolvable—that there is no single truth in the way we had imagined—but still, the way we see it at the moment feels so believable.
Our life story and the character we seem to be are all a kind of imagination. The past is gone, even a split second ago has vanished completely, and even the so-called present moment comes and goes so instantaneously that no-thing ever actually forms or persists in the ways it seems to. It’s always NOW, and yet we can’t locate this now in space or time. The whole movie—the characters and the storylines—are made of nothing more substantial than ever-changing, fleeting sensations, thoughts, memories, and mental images. None of it has any actual continuity or independent existence. Even the body is nothing solid or persisting, as we can discover if we explore it closely, nor can it be extracted from the entire universe that is supposedly “not the body.” Again, there is no actual inside or outside, no real boundaries, no substantial “things.”
If we watch as choices and decisions happen, we discover that they happen spontaneously, choicelessly—no thinker or chooser can be found “behind the curtain” (or inside our head) authoring our thoughts or making our decisions. They all happen by themselves. Even when there is long deliberation, each moment of that deliberation happens spontaneously by itself.
Although it appears otherwise, if we look closely, we discover that we don’t actually get to choose anything at all about our lives. We imagine that we can decide what to study in college, or what career path to follow, or whether or not we meditate or eat a healthy diet, or whether we engage in political activism or go on a spiritual search. But it all happens choicelessly. We don’t choose which people we’re attracted to, or which ones we fall in love with, or which sources of news and information seem trustworthy to us, or how we see contentious issues. It all happens by itself. We don’t know what our next thought or emotion will be.
If we are imagining ourselves as a separate self, this lack of control sounds terrible. What could be worse than being totally powerless in a dangerous world!? But actually, it is total freedom. Not the freedom to do what we want or to make the world be the way we want it to be, but the freedom to be exactly as we are in each moment, and for everything else to be exactly as it is in each moment—which is actually no way at all.
And the great revelation that may choicelessly dawn is that, ultimately, it doesn’t really matter what shape experience takes in the dream-like movie of waking life—whether there is what we call anger or compulsive behavior or a sense of being a separate self, or whether there is what we call equanimity, relaxation and a sense of undivided wholeness—whether the movie is spiritual or political or all about making money—whether there is what we call a nuclear war or climate change or peace on earth. None of it has the substantial existence or meaning that it seems to have when we label and define it. None of it can be pinned down or pulled apart from everything else. None of it is actually personal. We’re never really separate from everything else in the cosmos. We can’t ever really get it wrong. There is no boat to miss and no one to miss it. There are no mistakes, and there are no one-sided coins.
And in that realization, there is a huge sense of relief and relaxation and appreciation for the absolute wonder of everything, just as it is—including all the apparent horrors in the world and all our own apparent defects and imperfections. It all belongs, including all our (choiceless) efforts to cure and heal and fix what is apparently broken and dis-eased. There’s a Zen koan that says, “Medicine and sickness cure each other. The whole earth is medicine. What is the self?” What am I? What is this body, this mind, this awaring presence, this hearing-seeing-breathing-thinking-being? Does it have a shape, a size, a location, a place where it is not?
This aliveness, this undoubtable beingness, this awaring presence, this unfathomable reality can’t be grasped, and it can’t be avoided. It can’t be found because it can’t be lost. It shows up in infinitely changing forms, but the forms are as ephemeral as smoke or clouds. The apparent solidity and separation is illusory. From a self-identified perspective, when this view is applied to the seemingly very real dramas of everyday life, both personal and global, it can sound heartless and uncaring, but from the perspective of wholeness, it is the unconditional love (the open awareness) that is always allowing everything to be exactly as it is.
Our ideas about life are shifting sands endlessly being reshaped by the tides of whatever intelligence-energy is moving beneath the surfaces we see. This text is ultimately meaningless and purposeless—and that is actually its beauty and its liberating potential—although there is really nothing in need of liberation and no dividing line between what we might think of as “liberation” and what we might consider “un-liberated” (sinful or delusional). It’s that mystery again, the one appearing as two, the zero appearing as infinity, the lover and the beloved dissolving in love—not one, not two.
Attention moves by itself, choicelessly, from one apparent dimension of reality to another—in one moment, we seem to be a person in a very real situation, and in another moment, there is no center to experiencing and it is all dissolving into absolute no-thing-ness. Sometimes we are choicelessly worrying over a decision we must seemingly make, and in another moment, it is crystal clear that it is all unfolding by itself. Sometimes we are watching the news in horror, full of grief or rage or despair, and in another moment, it all seems to be energy in motion, like ocean waves crashing together. We sit down to meditate and sometimes our thoughts run wild, and other times there is vast emptiness. We judge one thing good and another bad, and then we judge ourselves for judging, and all of that happens by itself, choicelessly. And even more astonishingly, nothing is ever really happening—at least not in the way we think it is. After all, it’s ALL gone before it even arrives—how real is any of it?
This freedom to be just as we are, and for the world to be just as it is, doesn’t mean we like it all. It doesn’t mean we might not “decide” to see a therapist or go on a march for social justice. It doesn’t mean there won’t be discernment, urges, interests and aspirations, or that we won’t seemingly make choices and perform actions. All of that is how life moves. It’s like the ocean waving—one whole indivisible movement that is always changing shape while never departing from the Great Ocean of Here-Now.
It can be discovered that there is no actor apart from the action, no observer apart from the observed, no seer apart from the seeing, no doer apart from the doing. We’re only a dancer when we’re dancing, and when dancing, we are never apart from the dance. But without some distinction between this and that, the ten thousand things and the movie of waking life could not appear at all. We couldn’t function without the ability to distinguish this from that. And beyond the illusions created by the limits of our sensory organs and nervous systems, the words we use (subjects and objects, nouns and verbs) and the thought-stories built with those confuse us even more. We mistake the map for the territory.
But ultimately, the map is an aspect of the territory, as is our confusion and our search for clarity. Not one, not two. Even the apparent solidity and division and the intermittent thought-sense of being a separate “me” and all that follows from that, is never really a problem. It seems to be, in the movie, from the perspective of the character. And so, in the movie, we go on what seems to be a long journey of awakening and healing, making progress and having setbacks. But nothing is actually happening. None of it ever really exists or persists. None of it is personal because the person is a mirage, a character in a dream. It’s all only momentary appearances. And like a dream, when we wake up, it’s gone. It was never really happening. It was a real dream, but the content was unreal. And yet, this isn’t just “nothing” in some vacuous, nihilistic sense—there is an undeniable aliveness and presence.
Waking up from a dream can happen in any moment, and it can only ever happen now. But ultimately, it doesn’t really matter whether it happens or not. It only matters in the dream, to the dream character. There’s nothing wrong with dreaming or with enjoying movies—and we enjoy all kinds of movies—adventure stories, romances, comedies, tragedies, horror stories, war stories, love stories, family dramas, soap operas, thrillers. It’s all part of life, the dreaming and the waking up, the holographic layers of reality, the movies within movies—it’s all included.
I’ll close with a few lines from my friend Darryl Bailey, whose expression of nonduality is one of the clearest and cleanest I’ve encountered:
People desperately want to describe existence and, historically, they speak of matter, energy, consciousness, spirit, oneness, and mystery. But descriptions are merely limited interpretations. All of them. They can never tell us what life actually is.
– Darryl Bailey
So perhaps there will be a relaxing into not knowing, into simple open presence—enjoying the utter simplicity of what is—without needing to grasp it with words or concepts, without needing it to be different from how it is, without waiting for something bigger, better or more special to happen, without trying to have any particular experience—just simply relaxing into the unconditional love that welcomes it all and allows it all to dissolve completely. This welcoming and dissolving is the very nature of Here-Now.
Love and blessings to all…
Right Now, Just As It Is
