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Journey into Nothingness

NOTHING IS EVERYTHING

What is “nothingness”? Nothingness is everything. When you are in the middle of nothing you are in the presence of all things. Everything came from nothingness. In Western science, we have a sense of this with the Big Bang theory—that everything came after that explosion. It was actually a reflection. The journey into nothingness is going back to this nothingness. This nothingness is God, infinity. It is beyond words. That is what the Tao is. As Lao-tzu explained, “This Essence is beyond words. Since we do not have any words for it, I will call it the Tao.” And that is exactly what he was talking about.

When you use any word to explain the nothingness—God or infinity—you create limitations, and that is why nothingness is beyond all words. When you give the Tao a word, the words limit its actual scope or magnitude. In the Lao-tzu situation, he knew the monkey mind had to give “it” a name, so he just called it the Tao. Getting back to the Big Bang theory, as a concept, this is exactly what took place in the Taoist version of the creation of the universe, with the reflection of a concept into the empty space of the universe, which was the bang.

Fig. 2.1. Everything came from nothingness.

What we did collectively was form one thought or one energy, and, having this conscious thought, we sent it out to the universe, into the nothingness, and it was reflected back like from a mirror. This is the whole manifestation process. This is how we can also manifest everything from nothing because that is how we create everything in the first place. Life is really like one spirit: we form a thought, we send it out into the universe, and like a mirror, it reflects back to us the image of our thoughts into a physical manifestation. It is amazing what we can do once we understand and master it. Think of whatever we desire in life and send it out into the universe, and by projecting it into the empty space, it will come back to us a hundredfold, or exactly as we desire.

We can do a little bit of this each day and, over time, it will manifest itself in the physical plane. It will appear to us; it will happen when we least expect it. Whatever it might be, whatever the thought, configuration, or concept, it will manifest.

The original act of the total creation of the universe we do every day as we create through thought. By thought we can manifest anything we want. When we practice and understand the concept, we create the desire and it manifests. So, with a clear understanding of what we are doing, we can focus more strongly, and as we send our thought out into the universe, it sends it back like a mirror and manifests here in the physical plane. The more we practice, the more we can do it quickly and easily. By focusing on it every day, we will start to be aware of the manifestation. But without focusing, we will never pick up what we manifested. It never appears to be what actually is because we are confused with so many distractions. We either forget to look for it or we lose sight of what it is we want.

Fig. 2.2. Collectively, we formed a conscious thought, which was sent out into the nothingness and reflected back in the physical form.

It is very important to be careful what you think, because what you think will ultimately be reflected back to you. So choose your thoughts wisely and use very few words for it to be manifested. As you think, so you will become.

This is what happens when people pray. When they pray or petition to God, they send the energy out to the heavens and they expect their prayers to be answered. Sometimes they are, but not for the reason they think. If you have the correct concept, you will be more effective in the manifestation of what you are asking for. That is basically what prayer is all about.

Fig. 2.3. As we send it out, it manifests here in the physical plane.

Fig. 2.4. When people pray, they send the energy out to the heavens.

Prayer is asking God for something: virtues, a car, beautiful wife or handsome husband, money, or whatever it is. It is petitioning. In reality, what is taking place is that people are sending out their energy, and if they focus it properly, it is more effective.

From that empty space, everything has come. My mother once told me, “It is a great world if you do not weaken,” and I (William Wei) always told her, “It is a great world if you know what you are doing.” With this concept, you know exactly what you are doing and you will be more effective in your manifestation or your petitioning. You are God and you just have to utilize that ability within yourself, because you forgot who you are.

That is another interesting aspect of life: people believe that when they send their energy into God, it will happen or manifest—but it is not as effective as they like because they misunderstood the concept. When you put your energy into something, then it happens. If you do not put your energy into it or your understanding, it will not happen. That is why people talk about magic. They feel that the magician will have an advantage over them or lead them to disaster. In reality, if you have no energy to put into it or no belief in it, it has no power at all because the power is yours. As you give power or energy to something, it has life. If you do not give it any power, as in a system or understanding, it has no power over you. It is your energy or power, and that is the key to understanding any system or concept.

Fig. 2.5. The energy is yours and as you send it out into the nothingness, it will come back manifested and multiplied.

So you send the energy out and it comes back to you multiplied—but it is still your energy. It is the same thing with any belief system. If you put your energy into it, then it has validity. If you do not put your energy into it, it has no validity. You are the creator and you are the one manifesting. It is your energy.

NOWHERE TO GO

Going back into ourselves is to rediscover what we already know. We are just not conscious of it. So all we are doing is discovering what is already there. There is nowhere to go. There is nowhere to leave. We are here now, but to discover this is a slow process.

Once you discover this nothingness, the journey into nothingness is infinite. Infinity is a continuum. What this means for us is that we are continuously becoming, like climbing a mountain. You get to the top. You look around. There is another mountain. You climb that mountain. You look around. There is another mountain. There will always be another mountain. There will always be something to become. That is the nature of infinity—no beginning and no end. So it is a continuum whichever way you go. You will always become. So, if you are always becoming, there is nowhere to go because you are already there. In a relative sense, if you are always becoming, you are always getting to the top of the mountain. When you get to the top of the mountain, you realize there is always going to be another mountain. So there is nowhere to go.

There is nowhere to go. People get caught up in this rat race, this monkey mind environment of ours, and they are always saying, “Oh, I just need to do this and then I will be fine or I will have time to be with my family or be with myself.” They are always chasing something like a new job, to earn more money, to accomplish this or do that—but they never really spend time enjoying themselves and doing what really is. They fail to realize that they are always becoming something new.

Fig. 2.6. You get to the top. You look around. There is another mountain. There will always be another mountain.

Since they are always becoming something, they never really go anywhere, and they never really move anywhere. But their minds put them in the complete rat race. The other aspect is, whatever you want in life, it is chasing you, but you are so busy chasing it, it never catches up to you, because you are chasing it. If you sit still and wait for it, and you do what you have to do to maintain yourself instead of running around chasing everything, the thing you want will catch up to you. When it catches up, you can join and flow with it.

Fig. 2.7. It never catches up to you because you are chasing it; so sit still until it catches you.

Fig. 2.8. With this inner peace you will start to become conscious of what you already know.

That is the key: the less you do the better, especially with your energy and achieving things, because there really is no place to go. You are already here and everything will come to you. That is the effortless path of the Tao.

As you begin to sit still, you realize or rediscover what you already know, but you are just not conscious of it. As you still the mind, you start to see these things and you discover what it is that you forgot. This is the whole process of rediscovering.

It only happens when you sit still and find yourself at peace. With this inner peace you will start to become conscious of what you already know. That is really why there is nowhere to go and nothing to do. If you sit still, you realize that you are already there with no place to go.

FLOWING WITH THE RIVER

As one of my Taoist masters once told me, “Ah, professor, you need more suffering.” In other words, if you are doing something wrong, you are going to create pain and suffering for yourself. In the West, we say, “No pain, no gain”—but there is really no gain in pain.

In the Tao, if there is pain, then you are doing something wrong. Pain is an alarm system in the body. It is telling us we are swimming against the river. When we enter the journey into nothingness, we start to focus on the flow of the river. This journey into nothingness is a slow process. With the Taoist formulas, you learn how to make the discoveries of this journey on your own. You are your best teacher; you are the only one who can feel exactly what is inside you—not me and not any instructor. Only you know what it feels like inside you, and from that feeling you will get your direction.

That is why when you teach yourself, you start to become energetically independent and become self-sufficient in every aspect of your life. You will know exactly what to do for you because you have the ability to feel what is inside you and to know what you need. As you start to feel what is going on inside the body, you will start to connect with emotional and mental realms and you will know exactly what to do, when to do it, and why you are doing it. This is all in the path of the Tao.

Fig. 2.9. Pain is an alarm system in the body.

Fig. 2.10. There are three paths to enlightenment.

The Taoists say that there are three paths to enlightenment. One is of prayer and worship: it can happen but you never know why, when, or how. The second is of good works: it can also happen but you never know why, when, or how. The third is the way of the Tao: this is one of self-discovery. You know exactly why, when, and how, because on the molecular level you are discovering the wisdom and knowledge of you and your universe. It is taking place on a molecular level with an alchemical transformation.

That is why in every stage of life’s game—once you learn the formulas and learn how to tune into your own energy and pick up what is going on inside you—you will have all the answers that you need for yourself because you are the only one that can feel inside yourself. This will lead you to your own self-discovery, which is the Tao flowing down the river.

Look at the word guru and spell it out: G (gee), U (you), R (are), U (you). You are the guru, because you are the only one that can learn and teach yourself.

Fig. 2.11. The monkey mind can lead you away from yourself and your divinity.

We have mentioned the monkey mind several times. The monkey mind can lead you away from yourself. You are infinite and divine, but you have forgotten who you are, the forgotten God. Your ego (monkey mind) draws you away from yourself because it draws you into the monkey mind system of thinking. It draws you away from your path and your connection with the flow going down the river.

Once you start to work with the monkey mind, you give it things to do within the things it does. That is what is done within the meditations in the Taoist system. You learn to let the monkey mind move, and when it becomes bored, you will enter the void through this process.

Everything slows down once this meditation connects. The ego, the separation from true reality, will start to become tired as you let go of it. You do not give it any positive or negative energy as you let go and it goes into a dormant state. The minute you give the monkey mind or ego some energy (positive or negative—either resisting or going with it), you give it the power to overtake you. The key is not to give it any energy and use the monkey mind, the upper mind, just for its ability to observe, observing what you need to live your life.

The monkey mind gets you into a lot of trouble, so do not give it any energy, positive or negative. Once you understand how the monkey mind works, there is no reason to destroy it. The ego is you, too, and if you do not give it any energy, positive or negative, you do not give it the power to overtake you.

Fig. 2.12. You need to give the monkey mind things to do.

Fig. 2.13. If you do not give the ego any energy, then you do not give it the power to overtake you.

Learn to work with the monkey mind, learn to become one with it and allow it to be and have it in the inactive state. Just use the upper mind to observe. Use the middle mind to think for you—the conscious mind, the heart center. The lower mind is the awareness center, sending out radar from the abdomen all over the world and picking up what you need to pick up.

The key is utilizing the three minds as one—upper mind to observe, middle mind to think, and lower mind for awareness (the Crown, Heart, and Tan Tien centers). Smile down and connect all three into one. Then you can become your own teacher flowing down that river.

YOU ARE YOUR OWN TEACHER

You are the only person who can feel and understand for yourself. No one can feel for you. And that is the beauty of the Tao. The Taoists emphasize spiritual independence. They say that you are your own guru. You are your own teacher. The formulas can simply give you guidelines. You are the only person who can actually feel what is going on inside you. I cannot. That guy cannot. Only you can discover this. Only you can sense this internal transformation going on inside you. Your journey into nothingness is your own self-discovery of who you really are.

Your uniqueness is very interesting because when you were conceived, it was a one-in-six-trillion chance that you would be you. You are totally unique; there is no one else in the universe with that particular combination.

We have neither friends nor enemies; only teachers. They teach us what we need to learn. It is our own self-discovery within and what we receive is the reflection of what we should learn from others. What is reflected from others are things we should learn about ourselves. We are the only person who can make that discovery within ourselves. Everyone around us and every situation teaches us something new about ourselves.

As the Taoists have always said, “We must pay attention.” Watch the right and left sides because the right and left are always moving. To make that journey down the river you need the middle path. You can never find the middle path unless you know where the right and left are. That is why the right and left in extremes are our greatest teachers. They show us where the middle is. They are neither friends nor enemies; they are only our greatest teachers. We know where the middle path is and we know what we need to know about ourselves because we find that out in the reflection from them. The extremes show us what it is we need to know and that is why we are our own teacher.

If you give your energy over to a guru or religion, that is basically what you lose—your own energy. You discover nothing about yourself, even though you may pick up some information. When you transfer your energy and leave it to someone else to save you or take care of you, then it is up to that person to try to use your energy to take care of you. You cannot lose the energy, but you gave away the responsibility for yourself to someone else, and also your freedom.

Fig. 2.14. Watch the right and left because the right and left are always moving.

Fig. 2.15. Insights learned from others contribute to your own understandings and your own discoveries.

As the Taoists say, “If you learn to take care of yourself, then there is one less person to take care of.” That is how you help everyone else. In the process of learning how to take care of yourself and learning how to take responsibility for yourself, there is no reason to give your energy to anyone else. You learn to become your own internal energy manager. That is how you take control of your life and you maintain your freedom.

You can share ideas and concepts if someone is respectful, earnest, and sincere and is seeking the truth from you—but those are rare occasions. To put yourself in a position where you give your energy over to someone else, either to a teacher, a master, or a guru, you are putting yourself in jeopardy and at the mercy and judgment of others. Your fate will be determined by their limited understanding.

That is not a position to be in and it creates a whole codependent situation for you. You are dependent on others for your own understandings and your own discoveries, and they can never discover what is best for you because they will never be able to feel what is inside you and what you really need. Only you can make that discovery.

Fig. 2.16. You journey into your own self-discovery as you become your own teacher, guru, and master.

Through the Taoist formulas, you start to learn how to make that self-discovery, utilizing the formulas to develop the observation mind, the conscious mind, and the awareness mind, the three minds into one. You journey into your own self-discovery as you become your own teacher, guru, and master. You become your own parent, and who could be a better parent to you than you?

EMPTY VOID

Although the West conditions us to think of nothingness as an empty void, in reality, even contemporary cosmology tells us that nothingness is where everything came from. The Big Bang theory is a Western concept. It did not come from the East. The marriage between the West and the East is slowly coming together. Western science is discovering the reality of the East, which is the Tao.

Living in the Tao is a complete lifestyle. When you begin to look at things with your mind as an observatory tower and your heart as your thinking power, your whole life changes totally. But it happens gradually.

Fig. 2.17. As we start to slow down the mind, we start to enter into that emptiness inside ourselves.

Fig. 2.18. This emptiness that we talk about is the delicate balance between everything in the universe.

Fig. 2.19. Everything came from nothing.

The emptiness is really within us. Everything we think is actually an illusion about ourselves. Western science tells us that if we deflated ourselves, removing all the emptiness, we would be compressed to the size of a grain of sand. As we start to slow the mind down, we start to enter into that emptiness inside ourselves. When we focus within ourselves, we start to discover our own essence, and we link ourselves to the rest of the universe.

This emptiness that we talk about is the delicate balance between everything in the universe. That is exactly where everything came from. The delicate balance in the emptiness became everything that gives us the shape and form of the universe. As we start to connect with ourselves, we start to see the emptiness within us and that balance within our own being.

How do we come into relationship with the rest of the universe? As we enter the void, we start to connect with everything because everything came from nothing. Within the void there is the nothingness. That is our salvation—getting back together within ourselves.

TWO LITTLE PINE TREES

When I (William Wei) was a child, my parents moved into a house with two little pine trees right next to the house. Then I went off to grade school, high school, college, and had several businesses. As I was doing all this, I would visit my parents’ home periodically. I kept coming back. Finally, after thirty years, I walked up to my parents’ home. I looked at those little pine trees and guess what? Both of those pine trees were bigger than the house. I could not believe it. It was like they just appeared. But they were there all the time. If you looked at them, they were not moving or visibly growing. Over a long period, the whole transformation took place. That is exactly what happens in the Tao. By practicing the formulas over time, the transformation happens in you. It is so subtle that you do not even realize it until you look at it and see those two big pine trees next to that little house.

When you do the practices, your whole life changes as you connect with yourself and make self-discoveries. But it all happens very subtly. You do not realize what is happening in your life with the changes that take place. Our monkey mind would get in the way if we focused on the changes. It always upsets everything because it has to be active. If you plant a tree and you keep digging it up all the time, it never grows. Nothing is accomplished. The digging up is really the monkey mind’s interference with the growth process of that tree, the natural flow of the river.

Fig. 2.20. Those pine trees were bigger than the house.

Fig. 2.21. If you plant a tree and you keep digging it up all the time, it never grows.

This change takes place subtly. We are not really aware that it’s happening until one day we wake up and look around and see the change, and we cannot believe it. The two pine trees became bigger than the house. But if you look at them, they are not doing anything. They just sit there absorbing the air, mist, and sunshine, growing with the flow of the universe.

That is what takes place in your life as you slow the mind down and connect with the inner voice inside yourself. With this empty force or void, you start to develop a communication, and more importantly you start to formulate your consciousness, just like a seed growing inside you. This is the seed of consciousness. And what happens to a seed? It grows into a tree.

Fig. 2.22. This change takes place subtly.

When you have any questions about the Tao, just look outside into nature and the answers will come to you, because the answers are in the forest. Everything is revealed in the forest, mountains, rivers, sun, sky, and trees. As you look at the tree, a seed drops down, burrows itself into the ground, and disappears. Nothing looks like it is happening, but everything is happening. It is rooting itself in the soil—and then after six months it breaks the surface of the soil and becomes a little tree. In six months to a year, it becomes a pretty-good-sized tree. In ten to fifteen years, it becomes a big tree; then after thirty, forty, fifty years it is a huge tree; and in seventy to eighty years, it is a gigantic tree. Then a hundred years pass and it is that big oak tree out there. All we see is the big oak tree and we do not see the hundred years.

The same thing is true for us inside because we are growing that seed of consciousness. The same energy that is inside the tree is in us. What would happen if we dig up that tree before it starts to grow? Nothing. It just dies. We just let it be, we just do our practice a little bit each day. A little bit of sunshine, a little bit of water, and before too long it becomes that big oak tree.

Fig. 2.23. This is the seed of consciousness growing within.

Fig. 2.24. What happens if you give it too much sun and too much water?

What happens if you give it too much sun and too much water? It dies. So just give it a little bit, a little bit of practice each day. That is why we say to make this transformation we just do a little practice each day, five to ten minutes. You are that little tree inside and you do not need that much sunshine or water (i.e., practice) each day.

As you grow that conscious seed inside yourself, a little practice each day, a little sunshine, a little water, you will grow into that big tree. As the seed of consciousness gets bigger inside you, you do a little bit more practice as time goes along. The key is just to do a little bit. In the first five to ten years, this transformation will take place, and you will be like the pine trees, bigger than the house.

A LITTLE SEED

This is how the internal energy works in the body. The internal energy is infinity. That same internal energy in your body is in that tree’s body. When an acorn drops off a tree, it hits the ground. After six months or so, it slowly bores its way into the earth and disappears, but as it bores its way into the earth it begins to root itself. It appears as though nothing is happening. But after another six months or a year, it breaks through the earth’s surface as a little tree. Two or three years pass, and it is a little bigger. Ten or fifteen years pass, and it is even a little larger. Then twenty or thirty or forty years pass, and it is a big tree. But after a hundred years pass it is that big oak tree standing there.

Fig. 2.25. When an acorn drops off a tree, it hits the ground. After six months or so, it slowly bores its way into the earth and disappears, but as it bores its way into the earth it begins to root itself.

That is exactly how our internal energy transforms in our body. We are not aware of what is happening. As long as you practice a little bit each day, working with the formulas, giving the tree a little water and sunshine each day, gradually everything in your life will change.

The energy on this planet is here for us to learn to connect with ourselves, and that flow is within us. The same energy is in the river, which is in our kidneys; in the sun, which is in the heart; in the mountain, which is in the lungs; in the earth, which is in the spleen; and in the trees, which is in the liver. The universe is in us. As we learn to connect with that flow, we learn to flow with the universe, internally and externally. But it takes a while to make that connection and that realization, and many of us have been coming back trying to make that discovery. As the Taoists say, “You do not have to come back; you can learn all your lessons in one lifetime.” So, you can learn to flow with that river, flow with yourself, and let go of this monkey mind.

Fig. 2.26. No matter what you do, you will still float down the river.

Now, how you let go of it is actually working with it; you do not really give it energy either positive or negative. This is what the Taoists call the Wu Wei. You do not give any positive energy, because it will only trick you, and you do not give any negative energy, because that will give it the energy to overtake you. By letting go, you will connect with the flow of the river. So, what do you do? Really nothing. So that is the Wu Wei, the art of doing nothing, but of accomplishing everything.

Fig. 2.27. The universe is flowing within us.

Because when you are doing nothing, you do not obstruct the flow of the Tao, the flow of that river, and the flow of the universe. So, when the monkey mind sticks its head up, you do not give it any energy, positive or negative. You try to direct it indirectly, and you start to flow with the energy to just observe and try to convince the monkey mind to just watch, listen and observe, sense and feel. The real function of the monkey mind, as we mentioned before, is as an observatory tower.

So, if you do not give it any power, you do not resist it, and then you do not give it the power to overtake you. When you do not give it any power, the monkey mind goes into a dormant state. It becomes inactive, and then you start to connect with the flow of the universe. You discover the less you do in life, the better for you and everyone else. Because you take such an active role using this monkey mind in reacting to situations, you end up swimming against that river and you obstruct the flow of the Tao or the flow of the universe. The minute you give the monkey mind some energy, it goes from a dormant state to an active state. So, in the process of the Tao, you do not destroy the monkey mind. If you destroy the monkey mind, you destroy yourself. So, you cannot destroy it, but you can let go of it, because it is just energy, positive or negative. That is the whole process of the Tao, learning to let go. Letting go of a lot of our conditioning of culture and family. You just let go and you connect with the natural flow of the universe.

If you just let go and connect with the universe, you lose your consciousness, your individual consciousness. You are not losing consciousness, because you were never totally conscious. In other words, if you do not connect with the universe, then you never have your complete consciousness or what we call superior consciousness, superconsciousness, or total consciousness, because you are limiting yourself with your own perspective. So you do not have the rest of the consciousness of the universe. By connecting with the flow, not only do you have your own consciousness, but you also have total consciousness as well.

So you are connected not only with your individual self but also with the whole universe. To do this you must learn to let go. This whole path is what the Taoists call the Wu Wei, the path of nothingness, the art of doing nothing. Doing nothing, you do a little bit of what the Taoists call correct action. In other words, you adjust a certain movement or you observe in a certain way; this is action on your part, and you receive the most for the least effort, or very little action. It is like something’s coming at you really fast and all you do is turn your body slightly. You never even move your feet, you just turn the body and bend yourself a little bit, or you turn your ankle and your knee, but you never lose contact with yourself, and the other party misses you. So that is the correct action: you adjust your position or the position of your body.

As you slow the mind, the inner voice will start to direct you with correct action. It will show you what little you should do, or what correct action you should do. This will help you in your life. But this is a slow process, and as your monkey mind has taken over your life for many, many years, it is going to take a while to connect with this energy and this understanding.

The Taoists say, all you have to do is a little bit of practice each day, and as you do a little bit of practice with the meditation and Chi Kung, a conscious transformation takes place and you will start to learn to think with your heart and feel with your mind.

Fig. 2.28. It is like something’s coming at you really fast and all you do is turn your body slightly and you avoid it.

Fig. 2.29. Too much water and sunshine will kill the little seed. Just a little practice each day will grow a big tree of consciousness within you.

What happens when you give the little seed too much water and sunshine? It dies. It’s the same with your practice: as you grow the seed of consciousness within, if you do too much practice, it will die. The same energy in the tree is inside you. You just need a little bit of practice each day and you will grow into a big tree of consciousness within.

What happens when you keep digging up the tree? It never grows. The same is true with the Taoist practice: if you keep forcing it, it will never grow. Just do a little practice each day and let it grow. This is the yin part of the practice, the doing nothing, allowing the energy to grow just like the tree. This is the most important part of the practice—allowing the Tao to grow the energy. The most important part of the practice is to do nothing. And the less you do the better.

Fig. 2.30. Just like the tree will never grow if you keep digging it up, your consciousness will never grow if you keep forcing it.

Fig. 2.31. As the tree grows bigger, it needs more sunshine and rain, just as your consciousness will need more practice as it grows bigger.

One day your consciousness will grow into you and you will become conscious. This is the way of the Tao; this is the effortless path of growing the tree within.

When the seed of consciousness inside grows bigger and stronger, it needs more rain and sunshine (practice) each day to grow just like the tree in the forest. Listen to your consciousness and it will tell you when it needs more practice.

WHAT A LITTLE A LITTLE WILL DO

Just do five to ten minutes of practice each day when you start, and gradually build up as your inner tree gets bigger. It manifests itself externally in a very slow but methodical manner. And that is how you begin your journey into nothingness. As the Taoists say, “It is amazing what a little a little will do.” As you enter into nothingness, you enter into everything. A little of nothing means the presence of all things. As you focus on the nothingness, you become all things.

Fig. 2.32. You have to do some correct action, which is called the Wu Wei.

It is still important to do five to ten minutes of practice a day. Just like that little tree, if you do not give it any water or sunshine, it will die. But you have to do some correct action, which is called the Wu Wei. Correct action is just enough to allow the process to continue; not too much, just a little bit.

As a Taoist, once you start to focus on the Taoist formulas, you start to concentrate and draw the energy inside. You start to still the mind by drawing in and balancing the organ and emotional energy, and settling it. Then it does not interfere with your focusing because it is balanced. It is not trapped because the emotions become balanced and then you start to become detached. That is the whole part of letting go—surrendering in Western psychology or forgiveness in Christian philosophy. It is actually being detached.

Fig 2.33. You start to concentrate and draw the energy inside and still the mind by drawing and balancing the organ energy.

The Taoists have an interesting concept of how you totally become detached through becoming satiated. How you become satiated is like filling up a cup until you cannot put any more in it and that is when you became satiated. When you become satiated, you become detached from that particular desire or that particular imbalance. It is like when you were a kid and you loved to eat candy. You ate so much candy, and after you ate it and ate it, one day you just could not eat any more. You had had enough. You might have had a little piece occasionally but you never ate it like you did when you were a kid.

It is the same way with all your desires: you need to fill the cup or become satiated. It could be with owning cars, having relationships or sex, having power in business or manipulating people—whatever it is, once you satisfy those desires or become satiated, you do not have to glut yourself or hurt anybody. It is just a matter of drawing in as much as you can until you fill up that cup, and when you fill up that cup and become satiated, then you have entered full detachment.

Fig 2.34. You become satiated, like filling up a cup until you cannot put any more in it.

Instead of resisting these desires, you let them unfold in yourself. Sometimes we tell ourselves, “If I do that I will hurt myself or hurt somebody else.” But this overlooks one factor. When you do the practices, a little practice each day will start to balance your energy, by making the monkey mind run through the various energy channels of the body in meditation. Focusing on these areas will start to lessen your attachments and your desires by balancing the imbalances in your body.

As you become balanced, you can start to feel the satiation, and the cup will get filled quicker. Then there will not be as many attachments and the desires will start to fall away more quickly because of your internal practice. You are still becoming satiated, but you are also working indirectly to fill that cup by lessening the desires and lessening the compulsion to satiate yourself. So it is a kind of balance here, it is an interesting process that takes place. All you have to do is smile down, which is the first formula in the Tao. Just five to ten minutes a day. That is all.

Fig 2.35. Monkey mind runs through the channels and this lessens your attachments.

CONTINUUM

In the Tao, if you became the ultimate, you would be immortal. You would go beyond time and space and beyond reincarnation or karma. There is another immortal and another and another. So it does not really matter where you are. The key is to enjoy the process, to relax and enjoy the ride. You are actually journeying yourself into nowhere. It is a continual process of becoming. You do not have a choice whether or not to climb the mountain. Because you have an essence, you are part of infinity. If you are part of infinity, you are part of the continuum. There is no choice.

The only choice you really have is how you enjoy the ride. You either learn to flow with the river, which can be quite effortless, or you can swim against it, causing suffering.

If you are doing something wrong, you are going to create pain and suffering for yourself. When you are in pain and suffering then you are really doing something wrong and you need to change what you are doing or you will continue to suffer.

To use effort or to be effortless: that is the real choice you have. It is pain or balance and gain or harmony. When you have pain, it is because you are slowly giving back and counterproducing what you really need to achieve.

Fig. 2.36. The key is to enjoy the process, to relax and enjoy the ride.

Fig. 2.37. When you are in pain and you are suffering, you are really doing something wrong and you need to change what you are doing.

Life is actually a continuum, even as you go into the next realm. People always think that there is a place to go, heaven or hell—but there is no place. Heaven is really beyond time and space, and if it is beyond time and space then there is no place to go. The only thing that makes any sense is a continuum. You are continually becoming because there is no place to go. There is nowhere to go because you are already there.

Fig. 2.38. Life is a continuum and we are always becoming.

Fig. 2.39. You must learn to enjoy the ride within the whole evolution of becoming.

You are just working through your own self-discovery, becoming everything you can become. The more you understand that, the more you will start to enjoy the effortless path.

Once you become something, there is something else to become, so the only real enjoyment is in the process of becoming. This is the key: to enjoy the ride of becoming. You are always going to become something. That is what the continuum means: you are continually becoming. You are going from mountain to mountain and always coming to the top and seeing another mountain to climb.

SELF-DISCOVERY

In the Tao, if there is pain, then you are doing something wrong. Pain is an alarm system in the body. It is telling us we are swimming against the river. When we enter the journey into nothingness, we start to focus on the flow of the river. This journey into nothingness is a slow process. With the Taoist formulas, you learn how to make the discoveries of this journey on your own.

This is a process, and once you connect with the process you start to understand that we are being conditioned for instant gratification. You press a button and you get entertainment. You get into a car and the next thing you know you are on the other side of the country. You get on a plane and the next thing you know you are on the other side of the planet.

Fig. 2.40. You get into a car and the next thing you know you are on the other side of the country. You get on a plane and the next thing you know you are on the other side of the planet.

Everything happens very fast and quickly. When you want music you press another button, or when you want to watch television you just turn it on. You forget the fact that it took fifty years to develop television. You can watch a movie in one and half or two hours and you get the whole life of a person and what transpired in that person’s life. It takes many years and we cannot imagine how anybody could live through all of that, but they could not in an hour and a half. It was a whole lifetime, fifty to sixty years in which this life transpired, not half an hour.

The filmmakers take little pieces, but they do not give you the gaps, the emptiness between each piece, which make it whole. It is all jammed and condensed together; no one could withstand the pressure of it in real life.

Fig. 2.41. You forget the fact that it took fifty years to develop television.

That is a misconception, which is how our monkey mind perceives things. It gives only one perspective and misguides us because it only uses linear or one-dimensional thinking. It does not realize that the events of this life took place over a long period—forty, fifty, sixty years.

This is how our monkey mind deceives us, and the way we think with it. We need to look at things in reality—and the reality is that it is a whole process of becoming. This process is what we should connect with and this is the joy of becoming. We should sing to sing, dance to dance, run to run, read to read, just for the joy of it. That is the key and the Tao.

The whole joy of life is the process of becoming—not the becoming, but the process of it. That is the Tao and that is your key to your own self-discovery. As you discover this, you start to understand your own being and its relationship to the universe.

In the Tao, anytime you have a question, just look outside and all the answers to your questions are in nature. When you look into a pond and it is perfectly still, you will see a reflection of yourself. And when the pond is disturbed, your reflection will disappear. It is the same in higher-level meditations. When your mind becomes perfectly still through the meditations, you see the light, which is a reflection of yourself. The light, you see, is your true self. You are a light body and that is a reflection of what you see when you still the mind.

Fig. 2.42. Our monkey mind perceives things using linear thinking, giving us only one dimension of what is happening.

This is a part of self-discovery, discovering who you are. You are the light. You are a light body and that light is connected to everything.

This is all a process of self-discovery and it is the discovery of who you are. Once you discover who you are, you will discover where you are going and how you are going to get there. And this is the journey into nothingness.

Fig. 2.43. In the reflection of a stilled pond, you see your self, and when you still the mind, you see the light, which is a reflection of your real self.

Fig. 2.44. When you are present, you are there, everywhere, and nowhere.

One of the most important discoveries in this journey is presence. When you are present, you discover who you are. When you are present, you are there, everywhere, and nowhere—all at the same time, in a space with no time. There is no past or future. There is just presence and you are present.

You just need to focus, being totally present in whatever you are doing or not doing. When you are not distracted, you are present, and that presence is the Tao. That is how you become one with your self and the Tao.