The first step is the last step
When everything is nothing, there is nothing to look for. The apparent solidity of reality, such as a “world” or a “person”, isn’t actually solid. They are like water or air. The moment they arrive they begin to leave. There is nothing behind them, nothing supporting them, nothing motivating them, nothing controlling them. There is only the apparent nothingness of thingness. The mind continues to issue challenges to be solved or objectives to search for, but the mind’s projections are also nothing projecting. They are not real, yet it isn’t that they are illusory. They are simply empty, without substance, momentary, conjuring and dissolving. This is actually freedom.
Life seems to relax into this emptiness. Striving is no longer an appealing or real enterprise. What is left, however, is exactly the same. There isn’t glowing visions, fantastic insights, enlightening experiences. All of the above, and infinitely more, are empty as well. The search for truth, love, freedom, and so on has been revealed to be utterly futile. One can only search for something solid and real, yet no such thing exists. There isn’t actually freedom or love to be found. This emptiness, which the mind somehow ignores, is already that. The mind doesn’t want emptiness. It wants a fixed point to strive for. Freedom, however, is never a fixed point. Being free, no fixation is necessary, although fixation can arise, because freedom sets no limits.
The first step is the last step. Freedom isn’t at the end of a road. It is in the very footsteps. What a wonderfully confusing and hopeless journey the mind has gone on! But love is here all the way.
#Freedom
#Love
#Nothing
#Emptiness
Cover photo by Aman Upadhyay on Unsplash
