In the absence of the person

No wonder "you" cannot see this : This is a freedom that a "person" will never see.


How could a "person" ever accept that everything happens spontaneously, of its own accord, in the absence of the person?


The Tao (or Oneness, or God, or Life, or Spirit, or Emptiness…) has no centre, no mind, no personal volition. It appears as everything, but itself is nothing. Nothing manifesting as a world, as everything there is and is not. And there is only the Tao, which is to say there is no Tao at all.

And even to speak of it, even to think of it, even to do that is to lose it forever.


And yet the thinking and the speaking are fully the Tao; there is nothing that it is not.



It is the no-thing by which everything appears. And it’s not even that, because it’s not an “it” at all.

When speaking of the Tao, silence is the only way… - Jeff Foster

What are we to do?

Ah, we would if we could! Isn’t that the game that is the spiritual search? To give up? To surrender, to relax into Being, to plunge back into the no-thing?

But here’s the point: it’s always turned into a doing, isn’t it? “I need to give up! Why haven’t I been able to give up yet!?”. And so the game goes on. The mind will turn anything into a doing. It will even turn a not-doing into a doing, and spend the rest of its life trying to do that! Trying to do nothing! Oh, the wonderful games the mind plays, trying to save itself. It really doesn’t want to die. And so it creates all these terrifying stories about death. And it keeps itself going. Always seeking, always wanting, always hoping. Always fleeing from an illusory past, aiming towards a made-up future. - Jeff Foster

A new voice. . .

The vastness annihilates me. It literally destroys me. Walking through these empty streets, the vastness is there, consuming everything, every thought, every sensation. And yet the vastness is not separate from everything that is arising: the glow of the streetlamps, the shadows of lovers walking arm-in-arm, the rumble of night buses, the sound of footsteps on the cold pavement. And once again the secret that is so utterly obvious reveals itself: I am nowhere to be found, and I am everywhere. I am nothing, and yet I am one with all things, because there are not really any separate "things" at all. . .

I am annihilated in this, I am dwarfed by the vastness, I am made totally insignificant by the smallest detail: the little cracks in the pavement, the flicker of a streetlamp, a dog barking, the trees rustling in the evening breeze. Every little thing puts an end to me.

The eyes dart about, and with each movment of the eyeballs there is a new world, an undiscovered country. Nothing is the same from one moment to the next, which is to say there are no "moments" at all. Only this, only the utterly obvious revealing itself now, now and now.

And thought is not there: thought comes afterwards, thought is always an interpretation in hindsight, a useless addition, after-the-fact. Thought is dead - this is alive. Thought is of the past - this is so clearly present. This obliterates the past, this destroys it totally. How useless the past is! How useless are those little stories, the ones about "me and my life"! They too are annihilated with every footstep, with every breath. Every moment new, every moment fresh, every moment a revelation, a miracle beyond all words. - Jeff Foster