VBT – Meditation 33.4
It Is A Gain
To recognize Emptiness is not a loss, it is a gain; and yet it is not an egoistic gain. If you can see the subtlety of it… it is a tremendous achievement to understand that you are part of the whole, that the whole belongs to you, that you belong to the whole. And yet with such a great achievement, there is no shadow of the self.
It is one of the most beautiful understandings, that we are not separate — not separate from the mountains, not separate from the trees, not separate from the ocean, not separate from anybody. We are all connected, interwoven into oneness. The gain is immense, but there is no sense of I, of me, of my, of mine. As far as these things are concerned, there is utter silence and emptiness. But this emptiness is not just empty.
We can empty this room — we can take all the furniture, everything in the room out — and anybody coming in will say, “The room is empty.” That is one way of looking at it — but not the right way.
The right way is that now the room is full of emptiness. Before, the emptiness was hindered, cut into parts, because so much furniture and so many things were not allowing it to be one: now it is one.
Emptiness too is. It is existential; it does not mean that it is not. Somebody empty of jealousy will become full of love, somebody empty of stupidness will become full of intelligence. Each emptiness has its own fullness. And if you miss seeing the fullness that comes with emptiness, absolutely and certainly, then you are blind.
There is no self. And that’s a great relief.
You don’t have to love it, you don’t have to hate it, you don’t have to accept it, you don’t have to reject it; you don’t have to do anything: it simply is not there. You can relax, and in this relaxation is the melting into the universe. Then nothingness becomes wholeness.
Nothingness is half of the truth — immensely relieving, but yet it leaves something like a wound, something unfulfilled. You will be relieved, relaxed, but you will be still looking for something, because emptiness cannot become the end.
The other side, wholeness, has to be made available to you. Then your emptiness is full — full of wholeness.
Then your nothingness is all. It is not just nothing, but all. These are the moments when contradictory terms are transcended, and whenever you transcend contradictory terms you become enlightened. Whatever the contradiction may be, all contradictions transcended bring enlightenment to you. And this is one of the fundamental contradictions: emptiness and wholeness.
The transcendence needs nothing but just a silent understanding.
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